There are numerous threads on Reddit that explain very well why this concept is not really feasible [1,2,many]<p>The (imho) most important ones in short:<p>* Mechanical modularity increases size and cost, makes it harder to create a beautiful phone, and is not in the manufacturer's commercial interests. Therefore, it would be hard to find companies/customers to build/buy this.<p>* Many current components are highly integrated - SoCs, sensor ICs, Display/Touchscreen, etc. Making these modular would require development of many new components (and would increase size, cost, power consumption).<p>* The concept assumes that all components use a common communication backplane. This is not feasible, as a variety of voltages and communication protocols are in use in a typical phone (I2C, SPI, UART, USB, various display protocols, etc.). Many components need very short connections to the CPU/GPU/whatever without crossing other PCB traces. It is not really feasible to make this work with a generic communication backplane. Proper heat dissipation for CPU/GPU is another problem.<p>In summary, while it is certainly feasible to build a modular phone (look at David Mellis' DIY cellphone [3]), doing so for current hardware would involve <i>major</i> engineering effort (== design and manufacture dozens of new chips) and would result in less stable, more expensive, and less beautiful phones requiring more power.<p>Nevertheless, such ideas are certainly helpful to catalyze thoughts about future hardware.<p>[1] <a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/gadgets/comments/1m6y1q/that_phonebloks_things_annoyed_me_so_here_are_17/" rel="nofollow">http://www.reddit.com/r/gadgets/comments/1m6y1q/that_phonebl...</a><p>[2] <a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1m4pmy/eli5_why_is_phonebloks_a_bad_idea/" rel="nofollow">http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1m4pmy/el...</a><p>[many] <a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/all/search?q=phonebloks&restrict_sr=on" rel="nofollow">http://www.reddit.com/r/all/search?q=phonebloks&restrict_sr=...</a><p>[3] <a href="http://hlt.media.mit.edu/?p=2182" rel="nofollow">http://hlt.media.mit.edu/?p=2182</a>
While this is obviously very far from feasible, what _is_ possible is a return to servicability for the two parts that most commonly fail: batteries and screens. The rest of the phone is usually fine unless subjected to serious physical battering. The legendarily reliable Nokia 3210 is your landmark here.<p>Note that in a modern phone, the screen strength usually is achieved by bonding it to the case, so in practice "replace screen" turns into "take mainboard out of case and place in new case".<p>Modularity doesn't really help at all with the constant drive to replace working phones with newer, better ones. But there should be an effective secondhand market selling them to the Third world - and there is! No shortage of websites offering people money for their old phones.<p>Long term, we have to wait for the Moore's law slowdown, and a rise in Chinese manufacturing wages and other costs, before a local western repair industry becomes viable again.<p>(Apart from all the other issues, phonebloks would turn "Android fragmentation" into a far more extreme version; you can't guarantee that your peripheral will even be there next time you turn the phone on).
With everyone pointing out it's infeasibility in mind; didn't Bug Labs do something similar already?: <a href="http://buglabs.net/products/blocks" rel="nofollow">http://buglabs.net/products/blocks</a>
It immediately reminded me of this <a href="http://dansdata.blogsome.com/2008/03/03/stop-press-pixie-dust-unsuitable-for-household-lighting/" rel="nofollow">http://dansdata.blogsome.com/2008/03/03/stop-press-pixie-dus...</a><p>It's cool on paper, as long as you don't think about the technical implications. I guess it's a good project marketing-wise.<p>EDIT: this page is more comprehensive: <a href="http://dansdata.blogsome.com/2007/04/24/break-the-laws-o-physics-win-a-prize/" rel="nofollow">http://dansdata.blogsome.com/2007/04/24/break-the-laws-o-phy...</a>
This looks like a marketing stunt:<p>* the site does not have anything on it besides a video and an Amazon widget (go for the quick bucks?)<p>* it is not a real site, but a campaign on thunderclap.it (a new kind of service and really interesting concept )<p>* the video promotes an idea that you can have a good looking phone which you can customize however you want - who wouldn't want that?<p>* they let the impression that it's only the petty, nasty corporations that don't want such a phone to exist, just to be able to upsell us more phones and rip off our hard earned money, totally not addressing the technical issues.<p>What could happen (it already did) - the video and the campaign went viral, so:<p>* the authors of the campaign get a few thousands of dollars from the Amazon referral commissions<p>* people hear and see the power of crowdspeaking platforms in action (thunderclap.it)
as poorly thought out as this looks, what I wouldn't give for a smart phone with a very low resolution e-ink swapped in screen plus the opportunity to replace all the camerawork,sensors, storage , etc with more battery. At least this may get someone thinking about the idea.<p>also the video and concepts kept making me think of how hot a big metallic "speed block" would be against my hand
Relatedly, the Fairphone is shipping now: <a href="http://www.fairphone.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.fairphone.com/</a><p>"Fair" in the sense of "ethically sourced tantalum, etc"; but they've also thought about e-waste and deliberately included a replaceable battery.
Instead of trying to make improvements to Apple's (or whoever's) stuff, let's stimulate consumer demand for great looking _enclosures_ for (small form factor) hardware. There should be a market for enclosures that look as good as Apple's (or whoever's). Note I said "as good as" not "just like".<p>Give consumers the option to mix and match enclosures with the cheap electronics that go inside and see what happens.<p>The growing market for RaspberryPi enclosures stands as proof that it is possible to have many different enclosures, made by third parties, for the same PCB. And that consumers will buy them.<p>I've long wondered why there should not be a wide variety of enclosures to choose from for various popular small form factor "development" boards. Would such enclosures sell? Why not? The growing number of third party Pi cases being sold is testing that assumption.<p>I'd even go so far as to guess that if you give consumers great looking enclosures to choose from, you will actually sell more development boards.
Some issues I notice:<p>1. Blocks are having different sizes. Sure you may have some fillers, but they don't look nice. A light drop could shatter the whole thing (phone must be able to take hits and drops for many reasons)<p>2. The pluggable architecture calls for the backbone to be some sort of shared bus, example will be I2C, which may not be efficient for high-bandwidth transfer (e.g. camera to memory). A dedicated bus for some modules will just break the 'plugability'. Mitigation could be to zone the backbone so that each zone's traffic is limited, well, that is not simple...
This is a pretty naive idea. There are a lot of reasons to go in the opposite direction<p>For example, water-resistant phones are going to be hard to take apart, and that's a feature that will result in many fewer dead phones.<p>Packaging for mobile handsets is continuing to evolve. Any modular system would be obsolete long before it breaks even on repairability, upgradeability, etc.
I think this idea is brilliant. I may be in the minority but I think this would be a great thing for young kids to teach them how components can be swapped out very easily. I would get one of these for my 10 year just to watch him figure out what he'd like to add or upgrade.
In order to reduce electronics waste, we should recycle what's already there. Not invent a new phone that's easier to recycle. Also, people will want to upgrade or change their phone configuration even when it's not broken. I don't understand why the video is pitching the product as if its sustainable and fighting waste. It's not.
Relevant discussion on reddit: <a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/electronics/comments/1m4m0f/this_is_currently_on_the_front_page_a_good/" rel="nofollow">http://www.reddit.com/r/electronics/comments/1m4m0f/this_is_...</a><p>My opinion is that this wasn't thoroughly thought through...
I completely understand the appeal of the concept, but it seems like it would be significantly more expensive for the same features of another phone. I'd be concentrating on the features that most frequently drive upgrades other than the screen: memory and camera.
Site is currently down, here is their video on YouTube:<p><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDAw7vW7H0c" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDAw7vW7H0c</a>
My biggest gripe with this is, what problem does this actually solve?<p>Phones exist as they are as a sealed unit, so if something fails or you want something new, you buy it from the manufacturer or network.<p>Networks or manufacturers wouldn't want this kind of thing because it would affect their profits, so what's in it for them? What solution is it offering them?<p>That's before we even get into the engineering flaws...
one alternative would be to have a phone with a cpu that can be desoldered and replaced easily and in a more voluminous case (maybe a nice cnc milled alumin(i)um case)
Wasn't the Moto X supposed to be super configurable like this? It got me excited from the rumors and the hype. At the end it turned out to be just some colors that can be picked.<p><a href="http://www.talkandroid.com/154586-rumor-upcoming-motorola-x-is-not-just-one-phone-but-a-new-line-of-devices/" rel="nofollow">http://www.talkandroid.com/154586-rumor-upcoming-motorola-x-...</a><p>> And finally— the mysterious device(s) will be completely customizable by allowing the device’s color, RAM and internal storage to be completely configurable.