[hpsdr] New Hermes 2M Board.

[dlwaddel at netzero.net]

While John, AC0ZG, provided an interesting and compelling argument for BGA FPGA parts, using such parts will effectively prevent us tinkerers from building our own units. Positioning and soldering BGA components is dang near impossible without specialized equipment which few of us tinkerers can access.

As a side note, numerous manufacturers have had lots of trouble with BGA components becoming unstable or failing due to poor soldering. HP had a significant problem with laptops for a while and I have heard stories of others having similar failures.

Not that my votes counts for much, but I vote to not use any BGA components. I'd even like to see the leadless components replaced with components having leads.

>From a personal standpoint, I really enjoyed building my Hermes and would be pleased to build a newer version. But BGA components would prevent me from even considering building a newer version.

Don
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