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A comment on The chip shortage keeps getting worse – why can't we just make more?. Parent comment

Re:The chip shortage keeps getting worse – why can't we just... by Animats on Saturday September 04, 2021 @05:07PM (#28419220)
That article was back in April. Then, in August, "Japan’s largest car maker said Thursday it was cutting production in the country by 40% in September because of a shortage of semiconductors. The company declined to say whether it would shut down plants outside of Japan."

Most of automotive does not need AMSL 10nm and below fabs. They need robust 200nm to 300nm chips.

This may yield car redesigns with less touchscreen dependence, simpler electronics in the essential systems, and an "infotainment" system that's less integrated with the vehicle and can be added or replaced later. Already, some new cars have shipped with a blank plate in place of the entertainment system.

There's a mindset that electric cars have to be more complicated. This is strange, because managing the batteries and motors is far simpler than managing an IC engine.

[1] https://www.programbusiness.com/news/toyota-succumbs-chip-sh...

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Re:The chip shortage keeps getting worse – why can't we just... by VectorLock on Saturday September 04, 2021 @07:05PM (#28420186)
>This may yield car redesigns with less touchscreen dependence, simpler electronics in the essential systems, and an "infotainment" system that's less integrated with the vehicle and can be added or replaced later. Already, some new cars have shipped with a blank plate in place of the entertainment system.

I'd personally see that as a major improvement.

The highly integrated infotainment systems are going to make a lot of these vehicles feel obsolete before their time.

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Re:The chip shortage keeps getting worse – why can't we just... by maxerickson on Saturday September 04, 2021 @05:37PM (#28419505)
The shortages are hitting ECUs and body controllers, it isn't just the fancy cabin electronics.
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Re:The chip shortage keeps getting worse – why can't we just... by int_19h on Saturday September 04, 2021 @09:06PM (#28420838)
The car industry really just needs to standardize a connector (USB-C?) and a protocol for an external device to drive the dashboard touchscreen and any relevant physical buttons. Like Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, but open and universal.
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Re:The chip shortage keeps getting worse – why can't we just... by tbrownaw on Sunday September 05, 2021 @12:22AM (#28421612)
They already have a standard network bus connecting all the things together. There's even a standard debug port that exposes it, somewhere near the driver seat.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAN_bus

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On-board_diagnostics

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Re:The chip shortage keeps getting worse – why can't we just... by int_19h on Sunday September 05, 2021 @08:03PM (#28428959)
Yeah, but can that drive the display? My impression was that it doesn't have the bandwidth for that. Android Auto requires USB-C, although I'm not quite sure what the actual protocol on the wire is (but I wouldn't be surprised if it's the same as for USB-C displays in general, just with some extensions).

Most of the pieces are already there. The only problem is that they're proprietary.

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