Sunday, April 27, 2008

Inside the SD110 - 2nd step: the mainboard

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Just like in your computer, the SD110 has a mainboard where most of the logic chips and main CPU are placed. It's quite easy to get to; just pop the outside case off and there it is, under a layer of copper shielding, shown folded back to the left side of the picture. At this stage you can see several interesting features of the camera. First, many of the components are made by other companies, such as the two ICs in view, one from NEC and one from SAMSUNG.
Second, note how many ribbon cables there are on this card. While this may be the mainboard, there are a huge number of axillary boards, which you will see in later pictures. These boards are all attached with ribbon cables, which turn out to be relatively easy to remove and re-insert. Finally, note the ribbon cable on the lower-right, with the many silver dots. While it's not terribly clear, I suspect this is actually a testing port. The idea is that you could slip the whole thing into a connector and interface directly with the camera while it is apart. While this might be for repairmen to diagnose a problem with a camera that has been sent back for repair, another possible use is to test camera components while the whole thing is being assembled.

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