[Oberon] oberonstation vs. a $9 computer

[skulski at pas.rochester.edu]

Lars:

It is sort of funny that one can use the low price as an argument. How
much do you value your time? Let's say it is $5 per hour, way below
minimum wage. How much time will you spend on getting anything done with
any piece of hardware, be it Arduino, RPi, Beagle Bone, or Oberon Station?
Are you going to achieve anything meaningful in less than 10 hours? If so
then I will consider hiring you for $50 per hour.

The low price does indeed matter if you will use the hardware in a
finished product. They are talking of a disposable computer. If you are
going to basically throw it away after a single use (provided that you
environmental soul lets you do it), then indeed $9 matters. But if you are
going to do any development or experimentation with the HW, then you will
likely spend hundreds of hours doing so. Then it does not matter if you
invest $9, $90, or even $900 into your hardware. Almost any such amount is
dwarfed by the cost of your time.

Oberon Station is a development platform. The valid question is
"development of what?". The initial dollar investment in the development
hardware is not that important in this case.

W.


> The oberon station is tempting, but with Raspberry Pi at $35
> or the C.H.I.P computer for $9.00... that has USB,
> and WIFI that works like any wifi, the oberon station
> is really priced way out of the market.  If the
> oberonstation was around $50 more people would buy.
> How can you possibly compete with the C.H.I.P.
> for $9.00.