Hacker News Reader

Comment by diggan | Hacker News Reader

The full quote is "A Bosch Vivalytic analyzer can perform up to ten tests in the space of 24 hours. This means it takes just 100 devices to evaluate up to 1,000 tests per day." which makes more sense, the 100 devices is just an example.

But I agree that it's largely unnecessary, the initial "up to ten tests per day" would have been enough.

View on HN

The full quote does one extra thing, it implies that buying 100+ of these machines is totally expected.

Is this marketing?

Better (or worse) marketing: "a test takes almost 2.5 hours".

It's almost as if the decision makers that might buy these can't multiply by 10 very well. (Oh wait, they are probably politicians ... )

Is that true, or is it running multiple tests partly simultaneously?

Yes, and no. In runs nine tests in parallel (like Covid-19, influenza-A, influenza-B etc), but all on the same sample.

I'm not sure how they price these devices but it could make sense to compare against labs. The question is not how many tests a device can perform but how many tests you can perform for all available devices and at a price comparable to larger lab installations. Maybe 100 devices is a comparable rate there.

Larger lab with a variety of specialized equipment and trained personnel vs. a wall of these machines; very different.

Can these machines do anything else after we're done with Covid-19? I assume they can run other tests?

they also simultaneously test for influenza A and B

There is a chance we will never be done with COVID-19.

Obviously its implied because that's the influx of patients a lot of hospitals are seeing.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com