SKS Watch?

Right, but DanMan32 said that while the watch is solar powered, the fob uses a battery.

 

Toyota should work with Citizen to create a HSD for the watch. Solar/battery hybrid watch. Then, it can incorporate a regenerative second-hand wiht the watch so that the second hand movement recharges the battery somewhat.

 

Sign me up to have one implanted but $400 is way too much. These things shouldn't cost any more than the $20 pet ID implants. Since I'll be implanting it, I can't rely on batteries alone; I agree it needs a Hybrid Synergy Drive power source. The primary fossil fuel (methane from my digestive tract) can power the ICE portion and the HSD will convert the power into electricity to drive the RFID. I'll also need templates for tattooing a HSD logo on my forehead.

 

Ask Bill Merchant.

 

Fobs in general are not all that cheap. Just go around to dealers of various makes and see how much a replacement keyless entry fob costs. Toyota's non SKS Prius fob is $100 or more I think. Granted, it also provides RFID to allow the car to start, but still, fobs are not cheap.

Should they be cheaper? Probably. They aren't much more complex than a garage door remote.

 

<_< And probably less complex than a universal remote.

 

In economics there is no such thing as "should be cheaper". If it should be cheaper it will be cheaper. If the market and supply were big enough to make them cheaper they would have economies of scale and they would be cheaper, but the supply is limited because only Toyota can supply them, and the market is small enough that no other supplier has enough motivation to incur the reverse engineering and legal hurdles of duplicating them.

Toyota is constrained in the price they can charge... if they charge too much then people revolt and don't buy their cars. If they charge too little then they lose deserved profits.

 

Apple takes a loss on every ipod they sell. They make it up on itunes. They get 50cents from every itunes song sold, the record company gets the other 50.

Nate

 

Oh they make money on the Ipod.

There have been several complete breakdowns of the various Ipod's and the cost of the parts in them.

Most recently I saw one about the 4GB nano that retails for $199. I think the cost on it was around $110-$120. So they aren't making a lot of money off of it, but still not losing money.

No doubt that iTunes has a huge market share and nets huge profits. It is the most widely used source of music currently online.

 

It's the other way around. iPods make lots of money. They are high margin products. The songs, in reality, only make them a few cents per purchase once you factor in maintenance costs, bandwidth, and others...

You're thinking cell phones. Most carriers basically give you a phone for dirt cheap or nothing at all, but they get it all back from you from the contract.

 

When the mini first came out, it came with a 4GB microdrive that cost over $500. The mini sold for $249. In fact, Canon EOS owners were cannabilizing ipod minis for the microdrives! A firmware change was made to the microdrives in the minis to prevent this from happening.

Analysts are convinced they are losing money on the devices. It's the Xbox/ Playstation model, lose money on the hardware, make it up on the software.

Nate

 

It's important to remember that the market is two way, and not just "If you don't like the price don't buy it."
It is not only appropriate but it is also a good thing to express disapproval of prices perceived to be high.
Vendors (if they're smart) monitor sites like this to keep in touch with their market.
It's no more whining to express a desire for reasonably priced fobs than for heated leather seats. (And yes, I believe it is ok to use the word reasonable when comparing prices among similarly complex electronics.)

Nobody wants to deny you luxury timepieces that also act as SKS fobs by expressing a desire for good quality and reasonably priced equivalents for those of us with less bountiful resources.

 

Very true. The loudest way to express disapproval is to buy the product of a competitor, and the loudest way to express approval is to buy the product offered.

I certainly don't agree with the statement that "ipods should cost less". I think they are perfectly priced... they have plenty of competition and their competition is priced in a range from below ipod price to somewhat above. They are in the mid-to-upper end of the price range for MP3 players, which is completely consistent with their market leading position and value add.

The deal with the 4gb drives is an example of economies of scale. Apple got a much better deal on 4gb drives than anyone else because they ordered a zillion of them at a time.

The idea of disassembling an ipod into the volume prices of it's components and then assuming the sum of those volume prices are what a single consumer "should" pay for an engineered, assembled, marketed, distributed unit is a recipe for disappointment.

 

It wasn't me complaining about the price of IPods.
In fact I just bought one for my wife's birthday present.

 

The problem is that the IPod's popularity has given to third party interfaces that can connect to it through its docking connector.

Try and get a non-ipod MP3 (or any other compressed sound file format) player to be controlled by a car's head unit. It isn't going to happen. The only other way around that is if the CD player recognizes compressed sound files.

 

You got it. The iPod has the overwhelming market share. There's no way (unless there is suddenly a overwhelming development of the Bluetooth MP3 player) that any other MP3 players will ever be integrated into one's car.