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Open Standards for Cell Phone Components
PoisonousPhat writes "STMicroelectronics, Texas Instruments, Nokia and ARM have formed the Mobile Industry Processor Interface Alliance (MIPI), who seek to define open standards for cell phone components. Forget that expensive camera phone, just plug in a third-party device." Update: 07/30 18:13 GMT by T : Thanks to Alain Mellan for the link to STMicroelectronics.
I bet it will be like PC standards are. Nobody really conforms to all of them, 100%. Plus, there are so many standards, you're not gauranteed anything.
I been wanting a standard interface just for recharging. I hate buying new recharging equipment (desktop, cigarette lighter, etc.) every time I get a new phone. I also hate buying multiple versions of charging equipment for the multiple cell phones in my household.
This has worked so well with laptops, which are much bigger and more expensive than cell phones, so there's obviously more of a demand for it.
I can take any laptop, and swap hard drives. And I can swap, well, PCMCIA cards.
I bet it will be like PC standards. noone conforms to them
Sorry? Haven't you heard of IBM compatable?
I have over 70 freaks, do you?
An open standard could open up a huge market for 3rd-party products and accessories, much like the PC standard did for computer components. This is exactly the sort of thing that could really boost cell phone technology, by allowing smaller, more nimble companies to roll out new products into a broad market.
Of course, it's so good to think of, I can't imagine that it would actually happen!
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
who insist on a completely new design of power supply and data cable for every phone that they bring out :(
This looks more like an internal standard to aid developers to devlop embedded software / hardware components that build a cellphone and won't have any real effect on users.
The possibilities for software reuse will be limited to low level things like drivers, because all phone manufacturers feel the need to customise the software to make their product unique
This idea is good in theory. I've always wanted to get a cell phone and have the availability of nice features without having to spend outrageous prices. Now (in theory) I can buy a cell phone, basic model, and then buy an external device for whatever extra features I want, and have them work on the next phone I buy in 2 or 3 years if I want.
There are a ton of possibilities for external things, they just need to design the OS for the Nokia phones, which also shouldn't be too much of a hassle.
But you know this is going to be expensive as hell.
I sell out to The Man every day.
I just got the sanyo 8100 for $100. It was a Sprint promotion for new subscribers. I also considered a third-party device on a cheaper phone, but it was rather bulky and unmanagable. Open standards however would make for faster development and deployment of new technologies. Not to mention two-way radio across service providers THAT would be great.
Strangely absent from that list is Motorola... This is probably a good thing, but their absence is very conspicuous.
Be excellent to each other. And... PARTY ON, DUDES!
If the mobile phone companies start using standards how are they going to be able to force you to buy a new data cable, cigarette charger, hands free kits, and the like?
Oh, and God forbid that they have to stop charging $30 for a cheap as hell car charger and $50 for a data cable for the phones.
...And when they came for me, there was no one left to speak out for me." - Martin Niemoeller (1892-1984)
Is this the same Nokia who haven't changed the design on a charger since the introduction of the 5110 more than 5 years ago? And whose data cables are valid for a whole range of phones, rather than just the one model?
EGG, the Electronic Gamers Guild
Standardized rechargers will never come, though, because that would commoditize them instead of forcing you to buy a particular one for your phone. I would love to see the day when one "wall wart" can power anything, but it's just not gonna happen!
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With standardized cell-phone components, I am sure companies will be even more likely to stuff every last feature known to man onto their phones. Personally, I think it's getting ridiculous. I don't want to play Tony Hawk 4 on the 1" x 1" screen on my cell phone or struggle with watered down GPS functionality or grainy photos. On the other hand, what I do hope is that chargers become standardized. Now that would be something useful.
I always save my last mod point to mod up a good troll. You people are too serious.
This seems like ARM trying to get everyone adopting their standards. You can bet that ARM IP will be all over it. The ISA will be ARM, communication will be AMBA and the only standards complient accepted development platform will be the ARM SDT.
ARM is trying to get more and more fortified in their mobile phone market and its very difficult to do anything different. Thats why they can charge redicelous prices for their toolkits and the favours to universities (such as discount/free software) have now stopped, because now if you are going to learn low level mobile application coding then it simply has to be ARM. No need for them to attract and convince people to use them any more.
We even wrote our own debugger so we wouldn't have to payt the ARM tax.
Mouse powered Chips, Open source Processors and Lego
Data cables and handsfree headsets compatibility could be better though, but also that problem is going away with bluetooth, and IR has been there to replace data cables for a long time already.
Then again, are any other manufacturers any better?
The MIPI spec that is developed by this consortium is also mentioned here. They mention ST as a fourth player as well.
...a cell phone that would have as "flexible" architecture as PC.
Imagine this:
- Case: Different looks, about same width but different lengths. It provides two or three "slider layers" that enable you to install components.
- Necessities:
a) GSM decoder module (your frequency variant, possible sat phone)
b) Battery: Different sizes, different capacities. Separately a small power management module (change batteries, replace them, examine power levels, switch between batteries)
c) Main CPU. Different speeds and possiblities.
d) Internal memory (different sizes, may use more than one module)
e) Keyboard (normal, big, different highlight colors, qwerty whole, qwerty 2-parts (on 2 sides of screen)
f) Screen. Text-only, b&w, big, color, whatever you wish.
g) Speaker and receiver. May be different inputs.
h) SIM card socket. Possible double, triple, big, small...
- Extras:
MP3, Radio, FM, MIDI, IRDA, Bluetooth, USB, loud speaker, camera, TV pilot, whatever you imagine you can put in a phone.
And the case provides a single bus you plug your modules in. Each module occupies certain number of "slots" (of course keyboard, battery and LCD are big. Toys like MP3 player take way less).
You buy parts in variants you need. Want a good SMS'ing box? Qwerty and big b&w screen. Want gaming platform? Gamer's keyboard, color screen, strong CPU and a lot of memory. Want to keep it small? "mini" case and only necessary stuff of minimum sizes. Want a laptop-like thing? Carry a half-pound brick in your pocket with everything installed and 5 strongest batteries and built-in AC charger.
Add to that fully or mostly open-source communication software layer so people could write their own apps for it...
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TI/ARM/Nokia have been in bed together from the beginning of the cell market. With TI's OMAP structure(which includes and ARM and is the baseline for all of Nokia's future phones), it is not hard to believe that the three are trying to increase their market share by forcing out those nasty startups and the motorolas of the world. I can hear the sales pitch now, "and our software/hardware already meet the upcoming standard" Nokia has the software, TI/ARM the hardware. as for the various standards, change a couple analog components, and the they already have the software routines to handle it.
Yeah the hardware is the first step, but I think the problem (at least in the USA) is that there aren't very good standards across the carriers. Up until recently you couldn't SMS an ATT mobile user if you were on Sprint. This sucks. In Europe and Asia you can SMS anyone (ok almost ~ 90%)as long as they have a mobile number, regardless of the carrier.