Members C#minor Posted March 2, 2007 Members Share Posted March 2, 2007 I was reading the Nord Lead 3/Modular G2X thread and how that many now believe they are discontinued because Motorolla (a chip supplier for Clavia) had discontinued one of the essential DSP's used by Clavia, to comply with the recent EU directive, the "Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive". So I did a little diggin' and the Wiki page about the RoHS sent chills down my spine: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RoHS#Criticism In the article, they are talking about how the new PCB boards will be less reliable as the lead free solder substances are more prone to failure, among other things. They mention that there has been a serious incident in a nuclear power plant that was due to "tin whiskers", a phenomenon associated to lead-free soldered PCB's. What kind of world are we living in, are we moving forward or backward in time? How come the EU go with approving this law without comprehensive studies? Just UNBELIEVABLE :eek: By the way, I don't think it's far fetched that the reason of the Alesis Ion shortage might be due to this PoS legislation. Do you think that the "new" DSP and circuit boards will have an effect on the quality of sound in musical instruments and studio equipment? This would be really scary. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cloacal-X Posted March 2, 2007 Members Share Posted March 2, 2007 RoHS is a pain in the ass, but I think it's worth it. I don't know if you've ever known anybody whose had any kind of illness related to metal poisoning, but my sister experienced mercury poisoning a few years ago, and she's still recovering. Putting hazardous materials into the environment where they could potentially start entering groundwater supplies and such is foolish. As for problems with electronic devices in nuclear power plants related to Pb-free solder...there are just layers of irony there. On the one hand the legislation should allow exemptions for such situations, on the other what good does lead-free solder do in a {censored}ing nuclear power plant which generates all sorts of radioactive waste? But overall, the real problem there is just a lack of maintenance. In a nuclear power plant electronics decives should be routinely inspected anyway, and all the moreso during RoHS transitions. If anything, better lead-free solders and/or better fab techniques that minimize the negative side effects of lead-free solders. In the short term, there will be problems, but the fact of the matter is that all of these nice toys don't mean a thing if we're poisoning ourselves with them. E-waste is a real problem and I'm glad that action is being taken before the effects become more substantial. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members C#minor Posted March 2, 2007 Author Members Share Posted March 2, 2007 I totally agree with you in principle, and really sorry to hear about your sister. But that was not the point, I am not arguing whether we should clean the environment from hazardous materials or not. It's a must and has to be done. What I am arguing is: At what price? Check the Wiki article. What they are saying is that it's not a great improvement to the environment in many cases (studies done independently by the EPA in the US and University of Stuttgart in Germany), and that the post RoHS products could have a worse impact on the environment than was before. Go freaking figure. And now computers, and most importantly, electronic equipment outside of the consumer market will most probably suffer from reliability issues. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cloacal-X Posted March 2, 2007 Members Share Posted March 2, 2007 Check the Wiki article. What they are saying is that it's not a great improvement to the environment in many cases (studies done independently by the EPA in the US and University of Stuttgart in Germany), and that the post RoHS products could have a worse impact on the environment than was before. That's not what the article says. It says that according to those studies in some areas lead-free solder specifically (RoHS is about much more than leaded vs. lead-free solder, though that does seem central to many debates on the issue) performs slightly worse than lead solder in certain areas other than non-cancerous occupational health impacts (where the improvement is two orders of magnitude, i.e. 100 times). But that's not really an RoHS criticism at all, is it? It's just another reason improving lead-free solders should be a priority. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members C#minor Posted March 2, 2007 Author Members Share Posted March 2, 2007 Exactly!!!! And shouldn't these improvements have been done before enforcing the law? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Umbra Posted March 2, 2007 Members Share Posted March 2, 2007 I think it's dumb. At this point most lead is already recovered and recycled anyway. Lead recycling is widely considered to be one of the most successful recycling programs in existance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Cloacal-X Posted March 2, 2007 Members Share Posted March 2, 2007 Exactly!!!! And shouldn't these improvements have been done before enforcing the law? Yeah, they should have. The RoHS directive was proposed years in advance, so it's not like there wasn't any time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members fozzie Posted March 2, 2007 Members Share Posted March 2, 2007 I was reading the Nord Lead 3/Modular G2X thread and how that many now believe they are discontinued because Motorolla (a chip supplier for Clavia) had discontinued one of the essential DSP's used by Clavia, to comply with the recent EU directive, the "Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive". Your belief is not based on facts. The chips are not discontinued but Motorola spun off that chip division to Freescale; it is still available contrary to popular belief. In addition, it was speculated that the G2 expansion was also discontinued because of this chip / RoHS thingy, but Clavia clearly stated that the expansion is still in production. It's probably just the sales volume that lead to the items being discontinued. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ElectricPuppy Posted March 2, 2007 Members Share Posted March 2, 2007 I'm afraid that RoHS is going to make it harder (or at least less pleasant) to be an electronics hobbiest. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members C#minor Posted March 2, 2007 Author Members Share Posted March 2, 2007 Your belief is not based on facts. The chips are not discontinued but Motorola spun off that chip division to Freescale; it is still available contrary to popular belief. In addition, it was speculated that the G2 expansion was also discontinued because of this chip / RoHS thingy, but Clavia clearly stated that the expansion is still in production. It's probably just the sales volume that lead to the items being discontinued. I was careful in my phrasing. I never said it was a fact. I simply said that many people believe so, and that was the impresson I got from other forums. Anyway, the Clavia Nord discontinued models (fact or fiction) were the reason I digged for RoHS. I also thought I read this on the Roland Clan forum, but didn't have the time to check it. I remember reading that one of the reasons of the sudden disappearance of the V-synth keyboard in Europe prior to it's being discontinued, was because of the RoHS. What bugs me in all this is the fact that it seems that the current lead-free alternatives may cause several problems and make circuit boards more prone to faluire. What does this mean for my next PC? Will the motherboard have a shorter life span? Will the "tin whiskers" cause short circuits in my next new PC, synth...etc.? Too many unknowns, and yet hardly any manufacturer is talking about this issue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members fozzie Posted March 3, 2007 Members Share Posted March 3, 2007 I was careful in my phrasing. I never said it was a fact...... What bugs me in all this is the fact that it seems that the current lead-free alternatives may cause several problems and make circuit boards more prone to faluire. What does this mean for my next PC? Will the motherboard have a shorter life span? Will the "tin whiskers" cause short circuits in my next new PC, synth...etc.? Too many unknowns, and yet hardly any manufacturer is talking about this issue. That's OK, I didn't say that you said it was a fact, just that what you believed to be true was not consistent with (my understanding of) reality :blah: I dunno about the RoHS; I believe it is a bit hyped at this moment and as said before, it was announced years before. In addition, there are exceptions for situations in which there are no alternatives for the 'old and poisonous' method. My current guess is that manufacturers do not talk too much about the subject because it's not a major issue for performance and reliability, in which case the information is irrelevant to the user. But this is really just gut feeling, nothing objective. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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