The Garmin Watches don't have DRAM for power reasons. The processor is a memory constrained microcontroller without a hardware memory management unit. Without the MMU you don't get as powerful memory virtualization or process isolation.
People with direct experience of the manufacturing sector in the US and abroad (including me) will certainly tell you that America's capabilities have deteriorated, at least relative to other countries. The machine tool industry is considered a good bellwether for industrial capacity and there's been some good research on this topic if you're interested: http://www.bismarckanalysis.com/Machine_Tools_Case_Study.pdf
I've looked at the financials of hearing aid companies before. And the short answer is that the money is not going to the hearing aid company. Of the $5k you spent on your hearing aid, the hearing aid company was probably paid $500, and the other $4.5k went to the audiologist.
The problem is that most consumers' revealed preference is for better performance rather than replaceability or device longevity (I know some people here will express a different preference, but you are a minority of consumers). Consumers don't factor device longevity into their purchase decisions, so companies don't prioritize it during the design process. And it needs to be prioritized because design decisions for longevity involve tradeoffs with other device performance metrics like size, weight, battery life (you can improve battery longevity by decreasing the depth of discharge of the battery before a recharge is required), processor performance, price.
Unfortunately this article clearly demonstrates the problems companies face when they try to improve longevity at the cost of performance. Apple implemented processor throttling based on measured battery condition to improve the longevity of their devices, but even in this article, seemingly focused on device longevity, they still receive criticism for this decision:
"But even consumers who hang onto their old iPhones for as long as possible learned in 2017 that Apple released a software update that slows down old phones to counteract aging lithium-ion battery problems."
I can't speak to the CC26xx series specifically, but normally deeply embedded cores running a ROM stack like that have some additional SRAM which can be loaded at boot for firmware patches.
It's so amazing how electronics have progressed. a startup called Octavio Systemsn is now selling a single package that can run a Linux system. I wouldn't count it as running Linux on a single chip, (power system, microprocessor, RAM) because I believe there are multiple dies within the package, but still, super impressive.
This video was very cool. Are there any IC's that can perform analog computing for neural networks on the market now? I'm picturing something like an FPGA but with a bunch of op amps that you can connect into summers or amplifiers.
If not, how would one practically implement an analog computer for neural network programming (without several tables full of op-amps?)
Don't worry about the political climate too much though. Plenty of Californians are moving here, many intent on advocating for the same policies here that caused them to flee their state in the first place.
This is actually not true, here's a quote from the link that I posted.
"Conservatives also appear to be more generous than liberals in nonfinancial ways. People in red states are considerably more likely to volunteer for good causes, and conservatives give blood more often. If liberals and moderates gave blood as often as conservatives, Mr. Brooks said, the American blood supply would increase by 45 percent."
It's true that a lot of the money is donated to churches. But even when you ignore the money that is donated to churches, Republicans still donate a higher percentage of their income to secular charities than Democrats do, donate more blood, and volunteer more.
"many people from other forms of religion at war with government that wants to teach children science and evolution in schools and treat homeless people with medication, stable housing, and education rather than treating homeless people with prayer and preaching about Jesus."
I live in Texas, and I can tell you from first hand experience that this is a ridiculous and false stereotype.
Not only do Republicans donate more in absolute terms to charity, they also have lower average incomes, which means that the average giving as a portion of income is much higher. And it's not just donations to their church, Republicans are even more likely to donate blood than Democrats!
I'm not writing this because I want to claim the moral high ground for the Republicans, I see Republicans and Democrats as each having different takes on how best to help the poor. Neither side has a monopoly on empathy.
Freescale's fabs in the U.S. are all very old (like early 1990's old). AFAIK they only manufacture analog and MEMS type stuff there. I think TSMC manufactures their MCU, MPU's, and most other digital electronics. This is the 'fab-lite' model.
Really cool app, and a shame Apple rejected it. Using a spoon was a very clever idea.
Why did you choose to display weight in grams to 3 decimal points when the measurements are only accurate to within 3g? It would be better to not display the values after the decimal point, so you don't give your users a false sense of accuracy.
So the university goes through this process with all semiconductor companies that are developing processors, just to be sure that they're not infringing?