Admittedly it was a long time ago, but I worked in the semi industry and this isn't how things were done. We manufactured batches of totally obsolete EOLed devices for various customers when they had sufficient volume. Devices that are in volume production (e.g. for cars) are carefully managed by people who do nothing but ensure that they're available in the right place at the right time in the right volume. In order to not have product available to meet demand either a factory has to go on fire, or the customer has to screw up their forecast.
Why Carmakers Can’t Transition to Newer Chips
11–20 of 335 posts
Re: Why Carmakers Can’t Transition to Newer Chips
#12Really well written investigative piece. Its so often forgotten that safety critical hardware like a car ecu dances to a different rhythm than consumer electronics that just has to not explode in your pocket..
Re: Why Carmakers Can’t Transition to Newer Chips
#13This feels like lack of planning. The semiconductor industry was a known entity for many years before this level of integration came to vehicles. They should have known this would happen. Ultimately the industry will have to maintain their own production for consistent silicon.
As mentioned above there are folks who's entire job is maintaining the spreadsheet for said plan.
Re: Why Carmakers Can’t Transition to Newer Chips
#14> “We were able to substitute alternative chips, and then write the firmware in a matter of weeks,” Musk said. “It’s not just a matter of swapping out a chip; you also have to rewrite the software.” https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/26/22595060/tesla-chip-short...
ARM M family cores can run each other's code more or less.
Only the libraries for I/O need to be rewritten.
In some cases, there are drop in replacements (Gigadevices STM32 clones)
Re: Why Carmakers Can’t Transition to Newer Chips
#15> “We were able to substitute alternative chips, and then write the firmware in a matter of weeks,” Musk said. “It’s not just a matter of swapping out a chip; you also have to rewrite the software.” https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/26/22595060/tesla-chip-short...
I feel like GM and Ford are at US Government and NASA size where getting any change through takes so long and so much middle management and red tape that it stretches to infinity.
I’m sure Tesla is more agile than that. For better or worse sometimes…
Re: Why Carmakers Can’t Transition to Newer Chips
#16Admittedly it was a long time ago, but I worked in the semi industry and this isn't how things were done. We manufactured batches of totally obsolete EOLed devices for various customers when they had sufficient volume. Devices that are in volume production (e.g. for cars) are carefully managed by people who do nothing but ensure that they're available in the right place at the right time in the right volume. In order…
What an irony. Car makers with their volumes can buy decades worth of these STM32s for the price of a single car...
Re: Why Carmakers Can’t Transition to Newer Chips
#17Just like how they can't build electric vehicles 10 years ago. Yeah sure. The automotive industry is run on room temperature IQ's.
Re: Why Carmakers Can’t Transition to Newer Chips
#18> “We were able to substitute alternative chips, and then write the firmware in a matter of weeks,” Musk said. “It’s not just a matter of swapping out a chip; you also have to rewrite the software.” https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/26/22595060/tesla-chip-short...
Weeks? This has been going on for almost 100 weeks
Re: Why Carmakers Can’t Transition to Newer Chips
#19> “We were able to substitute alternative chips, and then write the firmware in a matter of weeks,” Musk said. “It’s not just a matter of swapping out a chip; you also have to rewrite the software.” https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/26/22595060/tesla-chip-short...
ARM M family cores can run each other's code more or less. Only the libraries for I/O need to be rewritten. In some cases, there are drop in replacements (Gigadevices STM32 clones)
Are there even any ARM Cortex-M chips that are ASIL-B rated or better?
Re: Why Carmakers Can’t Transition to Newer Chips
#20I'd love to see Ken Sherrif do a teardown of some vintage ECM.
https://www.autotrader.com/car-news/when-did-cars-get-comput...
(tldr)
> So instead of one clear answer, we have three possibilities: 1957 Rambler, 1958 Chrysler or 1968 Volkswagen.