Finally, we have production units coming in! I wasn’t sure if the Mexico CM or Colorado Tech Shop was going to be the first to deliver, but the winner is in: Colorado Tech Shop!

Fairly poor performance from the Mexico CM actually, considering how much later Colorado Tech Shop received their kit. Colorado Tech Shop had told me they would start my build at the beginning of last week. The Mexico CM had told me they would start their build last Friday. What actually happened was that Colorado Tech Shop started my build on last Friday, and today I got word from Mexico that they are producing as well.

Colorado Tech Shop production

First article was not trouble-free with Colorado Tech Shop either. Since they are local here in Longmont, they do have the advantage that I can get the first article right away, test it, tell them what’s wrong and move on with production right away. They had one wrong resistor value and the Ethernet PHY chip was 180 degrees turned on the first panel. Another reminder to never skip first article inspection, even if a CM has previously built a revision of your board!

They didn’t finish all panels on Friday but I got a bunch and have started final assembly, programming and testing of the ones I did receive. Very few issues up till now, which is great! The PHY has been coming up perfectly on all boards with the new PMS150C-559 reset circuit, which seems to be doing its job very well.

Mexico CM production

They sent me these pictures of a freshly produced panel today:

They have switched to manual assembly of the through-hole parts and now the unused pads are staying nice and clean!