YES, i know its for the hx4700, but they have similar guts, right? same processor....is this, or is it not good news? in my oppinion, if they are willing to do the upgrade on the hx4700, i bet they'd be able to do it on the x50
But I do wonder if the X50 will accept a third party RAM upgrade to 128MB. The FCC docs seem to imply that a model with 128MB RAM / 128MB ROM was tested. Perhaps this version may eventually appear directly from Dell?
It is unlikely that the SDRAM chip itself is the major cost. This has got to be mostly labor costs. These are BGA chips people (ball grid array) where all the tiny pins are located UNDER the chip. The days of big DIP packages from the 80's are long gone. Based on what I know, in order to replace a BGA chip, you would have to heat up the entire board to several hundred degrees, allow the BGA solder to melt and slide off, and then perform a similar operation to get the new one on. A very touchy operation, even I wouldn't want to attempt this. Two millimeters off and you're screwed. In addition, you would have to take the PDA completely apart and remove everything you can (such as the LCD and peripherals) FIRST, otherwise you could easily damage these components in the high heat.
Second, the $200 price is not just for "an extra 64 megs." They are removing the current 64 megs and replacing it with a single 128 MB chip, which is NOT that cheap. I have been unable to determine how much these chips cost in volume, but I would guess $35+. Most people are unaware of the fact that 128 megabytes is actually one of the LARGEST ram chips made today! In fact, up until this year, I believe 128 megs WAS the largest, but there might be 256 megabyte chips in production now. Don't believe me? Remember, a 512 megabyte PC2700 DIMM that you put into your computer is probably comprised of eight 64 megabyte chips, and older ones are probably sixteen 32 megabyte chips. Furthermore, people also don't realize that a 128 megabyte SDRAM chip has over a BILLION transistors. This dwarfs the size of a typical pentium 4 chip, which has roughly 55 million transistors (it's not really an apples-to-apples comparison though in terms of the type and size of transistors, but still, you get the idea).
Finally, a PDA does not contain typical PC-grade SDRAM, this is low-power mobile SDRAM that requires very little power to retain its contents. It will therefore cost more per megabyte than cheap DDR SDRAM found in desktop PCs and laptops.
What we need is for someone to pull an x50 apart and see what is inside. It may well be that ther is an un-populated spot on the MB for another RAM chip...I would guess this to be the case with the '4700 as well...
But I do wonder if the X50 will accept a third party RAM upgrade to 128MB. The FCC docs seem to imply that a model with 128MB RAM / 128MB ROM was tested. Perhaps this version may eventually appear directly from Dell?
Wow that looks awesome!! I would have gone for one of those if my return period hadnt ran out But then again the hx4705 is only a few more $$$ and the x50v is a few less $$$
The Loox 720 is pretty sweet, yes, but it's not without faults. Don't forget that the Loox 720 has a slower processor (520 MHz), no graphics accelerator at all, and currently lacks several basic accessories, such as metal cases (none are even being planned, as far as I know).
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But then again the hx4705 is only a few more $$$ and the x50v is a few less $$$
