Chris M.

Hello! I wanted to record some thoughts I had on predictions for ths coming year, if only to provide a record to check against in the future. Hope you enjoy and feel free to drop a comment with your thoughts! #1. Intel announces a new ISA to compete with ARM >30% - Not particularly likely in 2022 but more likely in 2023 and beyond Apple is selling a TON of Macs with M1 processors and these processors are very fast. TheRegister writes Arm's market share in PC chips was about eight per cent during Q3 this year, climbing steadily from seven per cent in Q2, and up from only two per cent in Q3 2020, before Arm-compatible M1 Macs went on sale. Apple's ARM based processors use an ISA (Instruction Set Architecture) that is newer and better designed than the x86 one used by Intel and AMD. While switching ISAs is a huge undertaking, users of the x86 ISA have higher power consumption and larger silicon area to perform the same operations. #2. Recognition for SAR-CoV-2 / C...

Hertz goes with Tesla The news that Hertz is purchasing 100,000 Tesla's has pushed the stock above $1000 its market cap over $1 trillion. This deal was an excellent move by Hertz and about the best one to get into the EV game that they could have made. #1. The Tesla Brand Tesla is a household brand, yet it has no advertizing budget. Tesla is also struggling to keep up with vehicle sales, achieving a 73% increase in vehicles shipped between 2020 Q3 and 2021 Q3. Hertz has gained a unique association with the Tesla brand. Interested in renting an EV or a Tesla? Hertz is that company now. #2. Worry free trips due to Tesla's charging network Charging on trips is one of the most stressful parts about having an EV, although this is getting better each year. No one worries about driving someplace and not finding a gas station but finding a charging station is a real concern with an EV, even in 2021. When I got a Tesla Model S in 2016 there were far fewer charging sta...

Tesla owners have noticed a change in the behavior of their cars, specifically in the performance models such as the P85 and the P90DL, where the performance of the cars doesn't seem to match previous or listed results. User wk057 has done some pretty extensive reverse engineering, modifications, and looking into the internal systems of the car, including the battery pack. On TeslaMotorsClub what started as a thread about battery pack capacities not matching advertized amounts, rated amount of available energy doesn't even match the car's own reported energy , turned into a thread called Pack Performance and Launch Mode Limits . This thread has kicked off a bit of a firestorm as these performance limits weren't documented or disclosed. It appears pretty clear that Tesla is counting the number of Launches (done through launch mode), as well as the number of Wide Open Throttle (WoT) events. When those counts go beyond some predefined values the car will reduce the am...

Faraday Future (FF) unveiled their FF91 electric car at CES 2017 in Las Vegas this past week. Some of the highlights from their presentation: 2.39s 0 - 60 mph, faster than the Tesla Model S P100D 130 kW battery (Tesla's largest is 100 kWh) Autonomous driving. And they demoed parking in this video: Here is their booth on the floor of the show: There were quite a few FF employees attending the show. Normal attendees were kept away from the car but some people were let inside of the area and able to get up close and take a look at it. My take on Faraday future I'm an engineer and an owner of a Tesla Model S. I'm also an investor in Tesla. I'm not skeptical of FF because they are competing with Tesla or claim to be building a better car. There is plenty of room in the EV market for well built vehicles. Due to the growth in the EV market FF could sell tens of thousands of vehicles per year without much impact on Tesla's sales. I'm a fan of E...

Tesla announced an upgrade to their autopilot sensor suite on October 19th, to be installed on all cars produced as of that day. This new sensor suite is being called Autopilot 2.0, or AP 2.0 for short, on forums. AP 2.0 adds several additional cameras and improves the ultrasonic sensors. It's also a big improvement in the visual processing hardware required to process the sensor data. You can read about it on Tesla's Autopilot page . Tesla's claim is that this system will be able to achieve "Full Self-Driving capability". The description of the systems capabilities matches the highest SAE vehicle automation level of 5 where the human has only to set the destination and activate the system. The increase in capabilities between AP 1.0 and AP 2.0 has caused a significant emotional response across the range of existing Tesla owners, especially as Elon has confirmed that there is no option for retrofitting. Should mention that retrofitting to full self-dr...

I've had a Tesla Model S for a few months now. How much does it cost me to drive it each day? Electric vehicles are more efficient than gasoline vehicles. fueleconomy.gov says : " Electric vehicles  convert about 59%–62% of the electrical energy from the grid to power at the wheels—conventional  gasoline vehicles  only convert about 17%–21% of the energy stored in  gasoline  to power at the wheels." Given an electric vehicles (EVs) increased efficiency, current electric rates, and gasoline prices, are you saving money on a per-mile basis when driving an EV? Tesla provides a calculator on their website to help people estimate the cost and cost savings between electric and gasoline cars. Tesla's calculator says it would cost $3.41 for electricity and $7.52 for gasoline for my typical daily commute of about 84 miles round trip. The text at the bottom of the calculator explains the criteria used to calculate those two costs, an electric rate of $0....

Our electric provider here in North Reading, Reading Municipal Light Department (RMLD) (http://www.rmld.com/), offers time-of-use and net metering as two alternative electricity tariffs to the standard flat rate. If your electric provider has these two options, how could you determine if either or both of these options would reduce your electric bill? Net metering is typically used by people that are generating as well as consuming electricity, for instance if you had a solar photovoltaic system. If you had solar you would very likely already have net metering, without a meter that supported net metering your solar system could be generating power and you wouldn't receive any credit for it. Time-of-use (TOU) tariffs vary electric rates based on time of day. TOU rates are commonly used by electric companies to help shape electric demand by increasing the cost of electricity during some periods and discounting it during others. Discounts for off-peak usage can result in the move...

Karma automotive is making its second entrance into the automobile market, officially debuting the Revero in a couple weeks time. Summary Marketing and selling the Revero is going to be tough given the quality, performance, and features of cars on the market today. Given this competition I'm surprised Karma automotive has received funding to continue development of the Fisker Karma , now renamed to the Revero. I'll present a few reasons why the Karma Revero isn't likely to make a noticeable impact on the automotive market as well as some ways they can improve their chances by making changes to the Revero. Note that the Revero's full specifications haven't been released yet. For the purposes of this analysis I'll assume the Revero is more similar to the Fisker Karma than not. The Revero is likely to improve upon these specifications but from what information has been released about the Revero it doesn't appear that these changes will significantly c...

I got a Tesla Model S at the beginning of June and we recently took our first long-ish range trip, a visit to my parents house in Connecticut. Electric vehicles are still relatively limited in range and more importantly in locations where you can charge. Normally I charge in the garage each evening after commuting to and from where I work in New Hampshire. I'm still new to trips that require a mid-destination charge. To mitigate some worry about where to charge I did some planning that I wouldn't consider if we were driving a gasoline or diesel fueled car. Tesla Model S P90 Tesla has a series of Supercharger locations  to allow long distance trips with their electric cars. If you do need to charge during your trip you'll want to route through these or other locations where you can charge. Picture by Jeff Cooper (jecoopr) [ CC BY 2.0 ], via Wikimedia Commons There are other options for charging your EV, both free and fee based charging locations, but these typ...

As a follower of technology companies and products I've been watching Tesla Motors  for years. With the Model S , Tesla has produced a luxury car that has raised the bar in terms of usability, features, performance, and safety and scored a near perfect score in Consumer Reports review. Tesla appears to be putting significant pressure on luxury car brands. The Model S  outsold, in the first half of 2013, Porsche, Jaguar and Land Rover  in California and in the first quarter of 2013  some models of Audi, BMW and Lexus . At this point, demand for the Model S appears to be outpacing production capacity. The current delivery wait on the Model S is two months or more, as indicated on the Tesla website. Today, at ~$70k USD, the Model S is in a different market segment and significantly more expensive than the the biggest selling EVs on the market. The  Toyota Plug-in-prius  (US$32,000),  Nissan Leaf  (US$29,650), and  Chevy Volt  (US$34,99...