On display
Market researcher iSuppli had an educated guess at the BOM (bill of materials) in the Apple iPad back in February. It estimated that the cost of all the materials in the cheapest version would be around $220.
Now that it has launched and we can take it to pieces, iSuppli has revised its BOM estimate upwards to more like $250, with the display and user interface components now accounting for over 40 percent of the total.
"While the iPad has the potential to change the game in the computing, wireless and consumer worlds, it already has changed the game of how many electronic products are-and will be- designed," said Andrew Rassweiler, teardown services manager for iSuppli. "The iPad's design represents a new paradigm in terms of electronics cost structure and electronic content.
"Conventional notebook PCs are ‘motherboard-centric,' with all the other functions in the system-such as the display, the keyboard and audio-peripheral to the central microprocessor and the main Printed Circuit Board (PCB) at the core. With the iPad, this is reversed. Everything is human-machine-interface-centric, with the PCB and Integrated Circuits (ICs) all there to facilitate the display of content as well as user inputs."
Among the other notable components are the battery that combines two cells into one pack, impling it's meant to be replaced at some point. The A4 chip is confirmed as designed by P.A. Semi and manufactured by Samsung.
