What a great article. It's amazing to see how many simple things can go wrong, and I'm sure there could have been more. Great work keeping your tenacity up and sticking through it.
Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product
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Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product
#52> As someone who generally stays out of politics, I didn’t know much about the incoming administration’s stance towards tariffs, though I don’t think anyone could have predicted such drastic hikes.
I have an appreciation for very bright lamps, and the project is neat, but that stuck out to me.
I'm always fascinated by people who both feel comfortable ignoring maybe the single most impactful society-determining apparatus but will also say "no one could have seen that coming", where that is whatever they were unaware of because they chose to check out. I find the stance so fascinating because for myself, it would be impossible to not try and understand why the world is the way it is.
Everything is downstream of politics whether people want to recognize that or not, and choosing to ignore it is, in fact, a political choice.
Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product
#53> Due to a miscommunication with the factory, the injection pins were moved inside the heatsink fins, causing the cylindrical extrusions below.
What happened after this? the factory have to replace the casting mold at their own expense or you have to pay for it?
Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
We use constant current reduction dimming so there's zero flicker!
That’s great to hear and a big plus, but I’m actually curious about the undimmed full brightness refresh rate of the LEDs.
If it’s constant current the “refresh rate” is infinite, or zero depending how you look at it.
Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product
#55Author here, happy to answer any questions about the journey!
Got a discount code for the HN family? ;-) Congrats on shipping. I'm living in the EU working California hours (4pm-1am) and will definitely be buying one.
Just made one - use HN100: https://getbrighter.com/discount/HN100 :)
Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product
#56Well-written and valuable for insight whether you have similar personal experience or not. As someone who does hardware and software as well, I relate to the challenges of making something you can hold; it's very easy to underestimate the challenge difference between the two. Your Murphy's law references are spot on; I feel comforted reading I'm not the only one this happens to! Misery does love company, and it's imp…
Thanks :) It turns out "hardware is hard" isn't an exaggeration!
Congrats on the first batch shipment! What an accomplishment. As someone who just crossed 10 years as a first time foray into HW, I'd like to tell you it gets easier. It doesn't but keep going anyway! Good luck.
Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product
#57Very interesting. I would like something like this, but not with LEDs.
Very curious why you want to avoid LEDs
No infrared spectrum
Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product
#58This is super interesting, and I'd actually be quite interested in buying a 60K-Lumen lamp... but not at $1200.
Years ago, there was an HN article "You Need More Lumens"[1], which in turn led me down a rabbit hole.
I ended up purchasing:
4 standard table lamps from Target,
28 2000-lumen Cree LEDs bulbs[2] and,
4 7-way splitters[3].
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10957614
Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product
#59I'm curious, what would be the engineering challenges (either hardware or software) in making it dimmable substantially below 2500 lumens, so that it could continue to work as a primary light source when winding down after the sun goes down, rather than switching to other light sources capable of getting dimmer?
Re: Lessons learned shipping 500 units of my first hardware product
#60> As someone who generally stays out of politics, I didn’t know much about the incoming administration’s stance towards tariffs, though I don’t think anyone could have predicted such drastic hikes. I have an appreciation for very bright lamps, and the project is neat, but that stuck out to me. I'm always fascinated by people who both feel comfortable ignoring maybe the single most impactful society-determining appara…
I'm doubtful that knowing how much politics matters, but only in a vague way, would have been enough to help them. Could someone who was obsessed with following the Trump administration's every move have predicted the tariffs in advance? I don't think financial markets priced them in?