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Tesla teardown finds electronics 6 years ahead of Toyota and VW

asia.nikkei.com

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Re: Tesla teardown finds electronics 6 years ahead of Toyota and VW

#61

Post by DarmokJalad1701 »

soygul wrote: post #18

Article praises Tesla's custom AI chip. It is something many criticize as a waste of development resources, while they could have used off-the-shelf components for the same task. Tesla's real advantage is their battery production. No one else can compete with them on battery price or production volume at a similar quality: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/10/teslas-competitors-play-catc...

Is it though? When they started development, there was no such chip specialized for NN tasks. NVIDIA chips are more general purpose and uses a lot more power. The FSD chip has an instruction set of around 18 instructions and is highly specialized.

Re: Tesla teardown finds electronics 6 years ahead of Toyota and VW

#62

Post by almost_usual »

ginko wrote: post #46
almost_usual wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With Larry Ellison on the board it reminds me of Oracle.

Wait, Ellison is on the board of Tesla? That's one good reason to hate the company I guess.

Yes, he’s also donating millions of dollars to a well known climate change denier.

https://ir.tesla.com/board-directors/larry-ellison

https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2020-02-15/larry-elli...

Re: Tesla teardown finds electronics 6 years ahead of Toyota and VW

#63

Post by norswap »

James_Henry wrote: post #42
bovermyer wrote: post #24

Note that the "we cannot do it" quote is not referring to the technology itself, but rather to the fact that to adopt Tesla's pattern, the legacy auto companies would need to ditch their supply chains. That's not something they can do without pissing off a lot of people.

The answer to this, I would think, would be to have a small part of the company whose soul purpose is to disrupt the larger company. Then Toyota and VW might have built Tesla in house without supply chain worries. When their in-house Tesla-like company proved a success, they could reasonably afford to upend their old supply chain: self-disruption.

Considering how much money went into the making of the real Tesla, is that really something these big auto-makers could have afforded?

Re: Tesla teardown finds electronics 6 years ahead of Toyota and VW

#64

Post by ghaff »

JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #11

This is the industry that took years to adopt the CD player, it’s not that hard to be technologically ahead of them. Whether that actually translates into more sales of cars is a different question.

Assuming that was the case, it wouldn't surprise me that might have something to do with the reliability of early CDs across a wide range of temperature conditions and use given vibrations, potholes, etc.

Re: Tesla teardown finds electronics 6 years ahead of Toyota and VW

#65

Post by iamatworknow »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #23
iamphilrae wrote: post #16

My brand new Toyota C-HR comes with an entertainment screen that is not Retina display. Technology that has been out for half a decade and is found in the dirt cheapest of smart phones. It honestly doesn’t surprise me that the rest of their tech is so far behind.

Automotive grade components have to survive greater temperature extremes and vibration for 10+ years. Disposable consumer products don't operate in the same sphere. Tesla has been burned by using consumer grade screens.

Why would someone need an incredibly pixel dense infotainment display in their car anyway? Does it show all the information I need? Does it have an easy to navigate UI? Will it last a long time and be inexpensive to repair or replace if needed? That's all I really care about for a screen that I look at maybe 5% of the time I'm in my car, because for the most part I'm looking at, y'know, the road and cars around me.

Re: Tesla teardown finds electronics 6 years ahead of Toyota and VW

#66

Post by lyime »

wil421 wrote: post #54
soygul wrote: post #18

Article praises Tesla's custom AI chip. It is something many criticize as a waste of development resources, while they could have used off-the-shelf components for the same task. Tesla's real advantage is their battery production. No one else can compete with them on battery price or production volume at a similar quality: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/10/teslas-competitors-play-catc...

Battery production seems like a problem that can be solved right now with money. VW and Toyota could partner with a 3rd party (like Tesla and Panasonic) and build factories. Custom silicon seems like a much harder problem for VM/Toyota. Unless a supplier can build something for them I don’t see either company innovating like Tesla. Basically Tesla’s secret sauce is the Tech not the EV components.

It’s both.

Continued improvements to battery tech will bring the costs down for Tesla which is important for them to do if they want to succeed.

Custom hardware and software will also give them cost advantage and help them in the long term.

Re: Tesla teardown finds electronics 6 years ahead of Toyota and VW

#67

Post by xxpor »

KaiserPro wrote: post #48

This is grand, apart from the build quality of the mechanics is ~10 years behind. Go to a tesla showroom, Look at the doors of the model three. Note that they don't line up. Look at the paint job, notice that there are bumps and chips, especailly on the edges of the doors. This is on a _demo_ car, stuck in a showroom. these should be perfect. Even a budget Kia has better build quality than this. Its not the isolated…

When was the last time you went and looked? Build quality has improved substantially since first Model 3 deliveries.

Re: Tesla teardown finds electronics 6 years ahead of Toyota and VW

#68

Post by codingmess »

KaiserPro wrote: post #48

This is grand, apart from the build quality of the mechanics is ~10 years behind. Go to a tesla showroom, Look at the doors of the model three. Note that they don't line up. Look at the paint job, notice that there are bumps and chips, especailly on the edges of the doors. This is on a _demo_ car, stuck in a showroom. these should be perfect. Even a budget Kia has better build quality than this. Its not the isolated…

Even 10 years ago, normal cars had doors that line up, and proper paint jobs.

Re: Tesla teardown finds electronics 6 years ahead of Toyota and VW

#69

Post by dontdoitpls »

KaiserPro wrote: post #48

This is grand, apart from the build quality of the mechanics is ~10 years behind. Go to a tesla showroom, Look at the doors of the model three. Note that they don't line up. Look at the paint job, notice that there are bumps and chips, especailly on the edges of the doors. This is on a _demo_ car, stuck in a showroom. these should be perfect. Even a budget Kia has better build quality than this. Its not the isolated…

The power of marketing is incredible.

No one else could get away with Tesla quality at luxury pricing, but they sell vehicles.

Re: Tesla teardown finds electronics 6 years ahead of Toyota and VW

#70

Post by technofiend »

swiley wrote: post #12

6 years ahead electronics here means AI ASICs. I thought that was weird, I know Toyota cars have radar and I’m not sure about Teslas. IMO as an armchair observer the sensor array is far more interesting than any of this. Personally, if I were to buy another car (and hopefully I don’t have to any time soon) I’d want the processing electronics to be off the shelf not weird custom stuff that’s going to have all kinds of…

After Tesla's recent secondary offering perhaps they'll hire some experts away from the big automakers and build a new line to automaker standards. Teslas built to Japanese or European fit and finish standards with their already ahead and ever improving electronics would (IMHO) be unbeatable.
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