What the hell is the diffrence between nRF9160-SICA-R rev2 and nRF9160-SICA-B1A-R

Question

We have been developing with the nrf9160 for a bit and now you guys pulled a stunt which is very weird. We are about to go in to production and you released a new version of the board with the B1A tag. Litterly no where in documentation it says what the actual diffrence is. Here on the forum you oh yeah you need it since its rev2. But our current prototypes are also rev2 and running the 1.3.0 and they are nrf9160-SICA-R but B0. So what is the diffrence now actually and what is the reason? Why should I change my complete hardware design for the B1A board would love to know!

Øyvind · Accepted Answer

Hello, 
 I'm not sure what you are referring to. The release notes of modem fw 1.3.0 states: 
 
 Before applying this version: 
 
 Note that this modem firmware is targeted nRF9160 SiP Revision 2 
 It can be used for nRF9160 SiP Revision 1, but only for testing and development 
 It cannot be used for engineering samples of Revision 1 ( e.g. DKs or Thingy:91 with version older than v0.9.0 ) 
 After you upgrade to MFW 1.3.0 it is not recommended to downgrade to mfw 1.2.x or mfw 1.1.x. (potential file system issues) 
 
 Read out your revision by either AT command: AT%HWVERSION or look on the nRF9160 SIP for marking "B1". 
 "B1" = Revision 2 
 "B0" = Revision 1 
 The AT command responses for Revision 1 and Revision 2 SiPs will be "nRF9160 SICA B0A" and "nRF9160 SICA B1A" respectively. Early engineering Revision 2 (B1A) SiPs and Revision 1 (B0A) SiPs might produce AT command responses such as "nRF9160 SICA BQA" and "nRFFFFFFFFF SICA FFFFFFFF" respectively. 
 
 Changelog: 
 
 QZSS L1C/A positioning support. 
 GPS time based configurable IO-pin / pulse. 
 GPS dynamic modes for stationary, pedestrian and automotive. 
 GPS power consumption optimizations during satellite tracking. 
 GPS enhancements to reduce GPS TTFF. 
 Support for 3GPP NB-IoT-NB2. 
 Support for 3GPP AS-RAI. Release Assistance Indication. 
 Support for Non-IP Data Delivery (NIDD). 
 Feature for application to configure country specific parameters to speed up NW search and connection times. 
 Feature for application to take benefit of modem sleep events. For power saving possibilities. 
 Feature for application to execute LTE channel pre-evaluation before establishing connection. For power saving possibilities. 
 Feature for application to measure serving and neighbor cells for cellular based positioning purposes. 
 Feature for application to optimize device power consumption when modem is searching network. 
 Feature for application to enable both LTE-M and NB-IoT system modes and modem performs automatic system mode selection. 
 Feature for application to configure RF Rx and Tx indications from IO-pin. 
 Speed-up improvements to modem cell selection and re-selection. 
 Power consumption optimization in LTE-M and NB-IoT RRC Idle mode. 
 Improvements for NB-IoT receiver performance. 
 Non-wired full modem update with pre-validation. 
 Support for on device key generation. 
 
 A complete list of new functionality, changes and bug fixes is in the release notes found here or inside the .zip file. 
 
 This release is aligned with v1.7 of nRF91 AT command reference guide . 
 It is recommended to use the latest version of nRF Connect and nRF Connect Programmer tools. 
 We have also published a webinar showcasing all the new features and improvements, you can watch it here . 
 
 From the our infocenter under nRF9160 series we have our Product Change Notification and Informational Notice (PCN and IN) where we release PCN_134 rev. 1.0.1 - with the following description: Power consumption improvement and marking change due to new regional certifications. These changes result to new device number and ordering code. 
 
 For further questions please contact your local RSM. 
 Thank you. Kind regards, Øyvind