• Chris welcomes Alex Haro, co-founder and CEO of Hubble, to discuss the ambitious task of connecting billions of Bluetooth devices directly to space
• The “banner level spec”: Hubble enables any off-the-shelf Bluetooth chip to communicate with low Earth orbit satellites using a software-only firmware update
• Alex describes the system as a global “Find My” for enterprise that also handles sensor readings and arbitrary data
• Addressing the “Bluetooth in space” skepticism: Alex explains that while the standard is optimized for high-fidelity audio, the chips can be repurposed to emit a custom software-defined waveform in the 2.4 GHz band
• The true innovation is on the satellite side: massive antenna arrays with thousands of elements perform advanced digital beamforming to pick up weak signals (0-20 dBm) from hundreds of kilometers away
• The “Dinner Table Analogy”: Traditional networks “yell” to be heard, but Hubble has the device talk slower (lower bit rate) and enunciate (error correction) while the satellite uses thousands of “microphones” to isolate a single voice
• Why Bluetooth instead of LoRa? Hubble co-founder and CTO of Ben Wild, is the architect of Amazon Sidewalk. He chose Bluetooth because it is globally ubiquitous and the 2.4 GHz band is unlicensed worldwide
• Technical trade-off: While LoRa uses spread spectrum chirps, 2.4 GHz allows for much smaller antenna arrays on the satellites compared to the 900 MHz band
• The hybrid network approach: Devices use the same SDK to communicate via a crowdsourced terrestrial network (apps and gateways) or directly to satellites when out of range
• Constellation roadmap: Hubble currently has four production satellites in orbit (covering the globe twice daily) and aims for 64 satellites by 2029 for continuous real-time coverage
• Removing the GPS chip: By using Angle of Arrival (AoA) on the satellite, Hubble can determine a device’s location to within tens of meters, reducing BOM costs and power consumption
• Future “Reverse GPS”: Once multiple satellites are overhead, Hubble can combine AoA with Time of Flight (ToF) measurements for even higher accuracy
• Network capacity: Each 10km satellite beam can handle roughly 100,000 simultaneous devices before hitting saturation, with terrestrial gateways offloading density in major metros
• Dealing with the “grumpy engineer”: Alex discusses lowering friction for developers by investing in the Zephyr Project and partnering with Texas Instruments to pre-flash the Hubble stack on Bluetooth SOCs
• Stack coexistence: The Hubble SDK allows the radio to time-slice, maintaining a standard Bluetooth connection to a phone while sending satellite packets during idle periods
• Payload specs: Data packets are 13 bytes, transmitted at 400 bits per second
• Business model: Pricing starts around $2 per device per month and scales down with volume to hit the “price elasticity” needed for tracking billions of assets
• Enterprise use cases: From tracking shipping pallets to monitor loss, to cold chain monitoring for pharmaceuticals and agriculture
• The SpaceX experience: Alex describes the “visceral” feeling of the double sonic booms from the Falcon 9 landing during their launch party
• Find out more at hubble.com (or hub of BLE)

• Introduction and SuperModerno: Massimo introduces himself as a "friendly nerd" and discusses his new project, SuperModerno
• The project aims to explain the "behind the scenes" of technology to prevent people from becoming "slaves to the platform"
• The History of Technology: Massimo expresses his passion for technology's history, emphasizing non-American innovators to show Europeans they can also lead in technology, citing the UK-based origins of the Arm processor
• The Legacy of Olivetti: He highlights Olivetti (founded in 1908), which moved from typewriters to creating the Programma 101, the first desktop computer used by NASA to compute orbits for the Apollo program
• Design as a Differentiator: Olivetti was the first tech company to apply design to everything (products, posters, and architecture)
• This inspired Massimo’s concept of the "invisible touch", the idea that consistent, intentional design creates a unique connection with users and gives a company a competitive edge
• The Interaction Design Institute Ivrea (IDII): Massimo's path led him to IDII, located in the former Olivetti research building, where he transitioned from a two-week sabbatical to a four-year stay
• Learning by Making: To help students with no electronics background, Massimo drew on how he learned as a seven-year-old ("learning by making") to remove the friction of interacting with technology
• The Founding Team: He met Tom Igoe (ITP) and David Cuartielles, and they realized students were afraid to be creative because they feared "blowing up" expensive tools like the Basic Stamp
• The "Pizza and a Beer" Price Point: Massimo aimed for a hardware cost of 20 Euros, roughly what a student would spend on a pizza and a beer, to encourage experimentation
• Building the Platform: Along with David Mellis, the team adapted Processing (a language for artists) by "surgically" replacing Java with C++ to create the Arduino IDE
• Ivrea Manufacturing: Leveraging the industrial base of Ivrea and Torino (the "Detroit of Italy"), Massimo was able to find local PCB manufacturers and assemblers just a short drive away
• From Hacking to AVR: Massimo’s early work involved hacking satellite TV PIC chips for soccer fans, but mentor Bill Verplank encouraged him to use AVR microcontrollers because they could be programmed simply in C
• Enabling Creators: Massimo shares stories of how Arduino enabled others, such as Josef Prusa, who started with Arduino as a teenager before building his global open-source 3D printer company
• The Innovation of Simplicity: Massimo argues that Arduino's true innovation is the user experience
• This is measured by the "Time to First Blink", the goal for a user to go from downloading software to blinking an LED in five minutes
• Standardization and "The Core": Arduino became an ad-hoc standard by providing a compatibility layer across different microcontrollers
• Massimo believes in having a "small slice of a really large pie" by allowing other architectures to work within the ecosystem
• Hardware Architecture and the "Lasagna": Inspired by the PC104 format, the board uses a layered approach where modules stack like a lasagna
• The "Shield of a King": The name Arduino comes from King Arduino of Ivrea; David Cuartielles suggested that since the board was named after a king, the add-on modules should be called "Shields"
• Hardware Design Choices: The board fits a credit card size (to stay within the free version of Eagle software) and is blue because that color was thought to be less tiring for workers' eyes
• Happy Accidents: The unique shape was chosen to be "ourselves instead of everyone else"
• During the design process, Massimo inadvertently moved a connector by half a step, creating an offset header that they kept for consistency after the first few thousand were made
• The Discovery of Auto-Reset: During a workshop in Germany, Massimo solved the frustration of manual resets by soldering a capacitor to the DTR pin, allowing the software to trigger the reset automatically
• The US Market and Legal Battles: Tom Igoe’s adoption of Arduino at NYU helped the US become the project's single biggest market
• This growth led to a difficult legal battle for control of the brand against a former partner
• Support from Arm: Massimo credits Arm Ltd (and CEO Simon Segars) for providing the strategic support that allowed the founders to regain control of the company. Massimo believes this is the first time he has talked about the role of Arm in the difficult legal process.
• Industrial and AI Expansion: Partnerships with Intel and Microsoft (Windows 10 IoT) led to early forays into TinyML (AI on small boards) back in 2017
• The Qualcomm Acquisition: In October 2025, Qualcomm acquired Arduino, which Massimo sees as essential for bringing "advanced silicon" into the family to handle the increasing complexity of technology
• The "Arduino Formula" and Layering: Massimo views Arduino as a formula for simplification that can be applied to anything, including complex Linux machines like the Uno Q
• This is achieved by building in layers, where beginners use high-level abstractions and experts can "strip away" layers to reach the bare metal
• The Future Vision: Massimo looks forward to the "Arduino Formula" being applied to new fields, stating he is waiting for someone to develop an "Arduino for biology" using CRISPR and DNA technology

• The lcamtuf Substack is where Michał is writing most these days
• Chris first found and geeked out about the CNC guide on the lcamtuf original site (discussed many times here)
• Michał is interested in the craft of teaching electronics
• He recently published The Secret Life of Circuits with No Starch Press
  • Use the code AMPHOUR26 for 30% off The Secret Life of Circuits valid from June 1st through June 30th
  • It was announced on his blog here
• Deriving fomulas from basic trigonometry sometimes bugs people who think electronics should only work with calculus
• Software geeks follow the site, often getting lots of attention on Hacker News
• Row hammer DRAM
• There were no Information Security degrees in the early days, so the field was made up of folks with backgrounds in math and EEs
• Fuzzing for security
• SMBC cartoon for blming humans
• Books
  • American Fuzzy Lop
  • The Tangled Web
  • P0f v3
  • Silence on the Wire
• Security stuff (including books on the subject) ages over time, as opposed to electronics
• On the subjects of Calculators (and Michał's collection)
  • Calculators are a footnote in the history of computing, but still intriguing
  • Dead ends in calculators
  • CRT displays on calculators
  • Nixie tubes
  • Discrete moving into logic gates into processors
  • Mechanical calculators are rare and get a high price online
• Working with transistors
• The Secret Life of Circuits start with FET based transistors vs BJT
• BJTs are often right after diode chapter because of the multiple junctions in an NPN, but that doesn't make it easier to understand
• Projects
  • A recent project involved making a clock out of current meters 
  • Woodworking and AI example
  • Want to see all lcamtuf articles in one place?
  • Sokoban
  • Sir box-a-lot

• PCBs we are used to ordering at low cost (JLC, PCBway, etc) are normally loss leaders to get larger business later
• Chris found his low cost microscope from Florin/Voltlog trinocular video 
• lcamtuf will be on the show soon, Chris bought a CNC mill because of a single webpage of his making
• TagMod board is a new breakout Chris made for injecting power through a 10 pin TagConnect cable.
• NXP devboards somehow have LEDs as bright as the sun
• Dave has been revisiting his solar analytics (update: he figured out he's getting charged more too!)
• Chris has been working at Canonical (makers of Ubuntu, new owners of Golioth) for a few months now. That was the trip to Spain.
• Dogfooding your own product
• Chris created a backronym: "Application Level Program Optimization" or... ALPO
• Chris built a new vibe coded project for talking to Zephyr devices using Web Serial and passing firmware packages over SMP
• CI/CD
• Debian now requires "fully reproducable" builds to harden against supply chain attacks
• Veritasium video about Linux bug

• Jason has previously been on the show
  • Episode 59 (!)
  • Episode 378 alongside Robert Nelson
• The BeagleY AI was the first board that mimic'ed the RPi form factor
• PocketBeagle 2 is still a small altoid tin form factor with a new processor
• The Zepto is a new product targeting a $1 price point for microcontrollers
• Many boards in the Beagle catalog now run Zephyr, and BeagleBoard.org recently joined The Zephyr Project as members and contributors
• Click Brand is the official bards from MikroElectronika that implement the open source Mikrobus
• Chris started using Mikrobus while designing early prototypes of the BeagleConnect Freedom
• The Freedom board talks over wireless to boards like the BeaglePlay
• Application spaces for different boards
• FPGA based board
• Cheeseburger robot? Well yes, but also Cheeseburger robot
• Mitchells vs the machine
• Krazam
• Click boarfds now have eeprom / ClickID as a 1-wire identifier with a uuid
• Beagleplay has 802.15.4
• Project ARA popularized the idea of Greybus
• MotoMods from Motorola was another implementation that worked on the Moto Z
• Using Freedom for prototyping
• WebAssembly
• ...on microcontrollers?
• Jason says he doesn't really like MCUboot
• Entering the linux ecosystem
• bb-imager
• Techlab is a way to easily extend peripherals for the PocketBeagle
• Known working targets
• Michael Welling designed the baconbits mini cape as a learning platform
• The BeagleBadge is a new formfactor shown in the title image for this episode. It runs on a new low cost TI part running Linux and yes... it runs Doom
• The Badge can also talk on Meshtastic
• Working with the memory shortage
• Bao - Bunie and Xobs
• Bella / Gem
• Beagle5fire
• RISC V boards
• RV32 Claire
• Find Beagle and Jason online
  • Schedule a meeting with Jason
  • There is also a Discord
  • And a Zulip instance
  • You can get Beagle merch

• Matt has been a guest on episodes 527 and 607
• Luke was a guest on episode 272
• Luke launched a new cable manufacturing and power supply company in the US called Werewolf.us
• Matt is working on the JS320
• We discussed how PartsBox is a great ERP solution but Matt and Luke decided to go fully custom with Claude Code. Jan Rychter was a guest on episode 542
• We discussed the differences with Product Lifecycle Maintenance. Michael Corr of the recently acquired Duro Labs was on episode 577
• CAM workflow
• A fully verticalized PCB factory is something Jonathan Hirschmann talked about on episode 299
• Jeff Bezos is investing 100B in a fund that is looking at automation in the factory using AI
• Matt recently had success with Claude Code and verilog programming
• Saleae for hardware in the loop using their APIs
• Other tools to check out
  • pyelf
  • pdfdk blast
  • superpowers skill (by past guest at Teardown Jesse Vincent)
• Luke used OpenClaw to power a chat agent in his ERP system
• Working with distributors
• TI backlog
• Chris recently learned that Digikey has a developer API
• Cocotb verification framework (in Python)
• Luke is working on vision experiments for inhouse developed AOI solutions

• Follow along with the blog post we discuss Two Weeks Until Tapeout
  • Matt Venn - TinyTapeout - Episode 616 and 672
  • Andreas Olofsson - openroad/openlane - Episode 254 and 650
  • Tim Ansell - Wafer.space - Episode 375, 501, and 703
• JTAG
• How do you know that tooling is or isn't working?
• Accelerator
• Rabbithole with floating point (post updated after recording)
• BFloat16
• Follow Julia on GitHubhttps://github.com/Essenceia
• Kapla (official website, not the much cheaper alibaba version):
• Dimity Grinberg personal blog

Alex is also the inventor of the original Power MOSFET and HEXFET at International Rectifier. Also, former CEO of International Rectifier (founded by his father!), https://epc-co.com We cover everything from inventing the power MOSFET on his first day on the job to silicon physics, AI data centres and humanoid robots. Enjoy.

• Zach listed the various places people can find his work, including
  • The Altium YouTube channel
  • Zach's YouTube channel
  • His personal technical blog
  • The Altium Blog
  • various industry conferences like PCB West 01:10
• Zach mentions that he has been creating video content and seminars for several years, traveling to places like Denmark to teach high-speed design. 01:10
• They discuss the recent acquisition of Altium by Renesas and how the company is trying to balance enterprise features with the needs of individual users. 03:15
• He notes that the pricing for professional design software has recently become more accessible for freelancers and consultants. 11:15
• He suggests that learning the fundamentals of EMC is one of the best ways for an engineer to become more valuable in the industry. 14:00
• He warns against relying solely on semiconductor data sheets for EMC guidance because they often contain outdated or incorrect information. 18:45
• They talk about the massive costs and delays that happen when a product fails its initial testing runs in a lab. 21:00
• Zach shares how his background in applied physics and lasers made it easier for him to transition into high-speed RF and digital design. 25:15
• He explains that he relies on mental models and specialized software tools more than solving complex equations by hand on a daily basis. 27:00
• He stresses the importance of understanding the physical manufacturing process, such as how circuit boards are pressed and laminated. 30:00
• They discuss the common problem of engineers over-specifying expensive materials when a cheaper option would work perfectly fine. 32:45
• Zach predicts that the most useful AI tools will eventually be built directly into existing PCB design software rather than living in separate browser tabs. 35:30
• He shares how he uses AI to quickly find generic part numbers, which saves him a lot of tedious manual searching. 42:00
• He compares different AI design tools, noting that some generate schematics from data sheets while others use proven building blocks. 46:30
• He describes an internal tool he is building to help him search through and reuse circuitry from his own past projects. 49:30
• He admits he isn't a fan of code-based schematics because he prefers graphical tools and doesn't consider himself a professional coder. 51:00
• He tells the story of how his popular one-minute design reviews started as a spontaneous way to manage the many requests he receives on LinkedIn. 54:00
• He points out that many designers fail to use their software's built-in design rule checks, leading to thousands of avoidable errors. 58:45
• They talk about the decline of mentorship in the industry and the risk of companies losing important tribal knowledge as senior engineers retire. 61:15
• Zach shares his goals for the coming year, including a deeper focus on manufacturing nuances and advanced EMC testing standards. 66:00
• He encourages engineers of all levels to attend industry conferences like PCB West and DesignCon to learn directly from experts. 70:00
• They conclude the episode by sharing where listeners can find more of his technical articles and videos online. 1:02:30

Welcome David Ray of Cyber City Circuits

• The “Retro Electro” Series: David explains his passion for writing historical articles for Digi Key, focusing on “giants” like Orstead whose contributions to electricity are often overlooked. • Career Background: David details his path from Marine Corps radio repair to cash register and Motorola radio repair. • Starting the Business: In late 2019, David cashed in his retirement to buy pick-and-place machines and start his own factory. • Teaching the First Lady: David recounts the story of teaching First Lady Jill Biden how to solder during a summer camp. • Growth via Twitter: For the first few years, 95% of his revenue came from relationships built on Twitter (X). • The Kit Business: David discusses his “Soldering Kit of the Month” program, noting that while fun, the kit business is exhausting and low-margin. • Equipment & Machines: A discussion on why he uses Charm High machines and his strong advice to buy new equipment rather than used industrial machines, which are often sold because they are “used up”. • Stencils & Paste: David advocates for framed stencils and GC10 solder paste, which is shelf-stable and prevents cold solder joints. • Soldering Physics: Insights into the thermodynamics of soldering, especially the difficulty of working with 2 oz copper boards. • John Fluke History: David previews his research on John Fluke, explaining that Fluke meters became yellow because the Navy had trouble finding gray ones on the ground. • Upcoming Articles: David mentions future work on the history of Op-amps and strain gauges. • Business Services: Overview of Cyber City Circuits’ services, including reverse engineering, obsolescence engineering, and free DFM (Design for Manufacturing) consulting. • Success Philosophy: David shares his “Monopoly mindset,” viewing business setbacks as “chance cards,” and stresses that persistence is the only way to avoid failure.

Links from David

• Pebble is back after Eric worked with Google to open source PebbleOS and he reaquired the naming rights
• Eric returns to the hardware space after 7 years, including working at yCombinator, a famous accelerator for early stage startups, and on Beeper, a cross platform app for messaging.
• While discussing the difficulties of hardware project, Chris brought up a recent post about a high wattage lamp project HN
• One thing Eric likes about hardware projects vs software is that "hardware projects can be done" as in they have a defined end state
• A more recent project is a smart ring - The Index 01.
• The non-replaceable battery is driven by the product specs, also the need for reliability
• The ring doesn't immediately need to be in range of a phone, it syncs the memory after the fact
• Pebble is no longer a VC backed startup with a subscription model, so that changes a lot of constraints
• Initially they sold 2 million watches, and 250 million in sales
• Eric is driven by "gadgets". He read "pen computing" and "popular mechanics" as a kid
• Consumer companies vs other types (and why Eric likes the former)
• Pebble went through different phases
• The team spent 6 months in China, designing the first consumer version and working directly with factories
• CTO of (original) Pebble, Andrew Witte, was a somewhat early guest of The Amp Hour
• How much did the China ecosystem drive design decisions?
• There was no such thing as a smartwatch factory (but are there ever now!)
• The book Apple in China is supposed to be a great read and mirrors the Pebble Experience
• We heard from Chrissy Meyer when she was on the show about working with the Apple Watch manufacturing proces
• Water proof methods codeveloping in China
• It's an interative process of submerging designs in a glass vessel with pressure and bubbles seep out of the device at different points
• The remedy? According to Eric: "More Glue" :-D
• Eric shares his process on a YouTube channel called Tick Talk (not to be confused with the shortform video site)
• There is a video with the CEO of SiFli, makers of the Bluetooth chip that is in the most recent Pebble devices
• One interesting feature is a custom bus to the Sharp-made ePaper-like screen used onboard
• FreeRTOS pebble OS
• What is PebbleOS?
• It's targeted at an m33 class ARM chip and the kernel is FreeRTOS
• The bluetooth stack is nimBLE
• Eric went back and forth on whether to port to Zephyr for the Bluetooth stack and hw support from vendors like Nordic Semiconductor
• The Index 01 ring is Dialog Semiconductor (now part of Renesas) part
• One challenge is that rings have different sizes...so they mill the rings based on orders. The larger rings get an extra battery!

• Martin is a long time journalist in the electronics space, having worked at magazines like EDN, Test and Measurement World, EE World, and more!
• Kenneth Wyatt
• Concentrated vs diffuse information
• Product reviews
• Unitrend scope video
• Tek 5 series B
• Wirecutter for test equipment / parts
• Skepticism
• Webinars - 3 levels
• Martin has an HP34401A early model
• Touring T&M companies
• Littelfuse
• Martin is in the Boston area
• Boxborough has multiple EMI labs
• Article on building an anechoic chamber
• PCB East was in Boxborough now in Worcester ("Wuh - Stah" :-D )
• International Microwave Symposium (IMS) inBoston this year
• What is driving the Boston ecosystem?
• NYU wireless
• 6G summit
• Components trickling down into the other parts of the industry
• Ted Rappaport from NYU writing a paper
• Open RAN
• 5G standalone vs nonstandalone
• Poster session
• ISAC
• Test equipment has to test everything leading edge
• 3GPP
• The impacts of satellite connectivity
• IoT still talking about LTE
• 5G modems and battery life
• Private networks
• Automation software
• The Measurement Blues song, among others
• Find him online
  • Martin Rowe on LinkedIn
  • EEworldonline
• Martin sent over some links related the things we discussed during the episode
  • 6G discussions: How things have changed. We assembled a timeline of the topics so you can see what's come and gone
  • Nokia Bell Labs’ Peter Vetter talks 6G research Live from the Brooklyn 6G Summitd
  • Teardown: HP 8112A pulse generator - I bought this at a flea market. MIT holds these once a month April through October. I go every year to buy things for teardowns and to take photos.
  • DSL router uses parts from old phones - Heard about this from a European telecom newsletter and just had to get the details
  • The slide keyboard is back, in a 5G phone - Video interview from 2020. I mentioned the Psion Organizer. The designer of this phone used to work for Psion. He designs beautiful products.
  • Tryout: two low-cost USB inline meters and a load - My latest. This was the one where the audio in the videos seemed overdubbed. I uploaded the videos again using different file names. Seems OK now.

• Aaed is a YouTuber who builds a variety of robots and a mechanical engineering student at Purdue. He just completed his undergrad degree and is now working on his Master's degree. I believe he is the first Amp Hour guest who is still a full time student.
• His channel has a great variety of builds including designing all the way down to gearboxes.
• Aaed says the MIT "mini cheetah" launched many low(er) costs builds of robots, including his own.
• Boston Dynamics (and many others) announced their new ATLAS robotics platform at CES this year.
• FOC motor controller
• Backlash is a measure of how much movement you have between the teeth of gears (and thus how accurate you can be with open loop control)
• Ball bearing balancing robot
• Inverse kinematics
• Past guest of the show James Bruton was a model for the builds that Aaed does
• what does the glue look like
• His recent build uses...rope...to build a robot dog?
• A Capstan drive has virtually zero backlash
• "relatively new rope" DM20
• High precision speed reducer using rope
• the impacts of materials on design processes
• Juicero
• Relationship with classmates and professors as a YouTuber
• Purdue Engineering
• Aaed picked up electronics from youtube
• What's his take on LLMs?
• Making next CARA open source
• New video recently came out about a spinning top
• bulk of the cost is in the motors and motor controllers
• growing up in the age of youtubers

• Mark has been at Duke since 1996, and has completed undergraduate, graduate, medical, and PhD degrees here (!)
• He has focused on making medical devices and now teaches others to do the same in his Biomedical Engineering (BME) courses
• Verification and Validation (v&v) is a large constraint in getting a regulated medical device to market
• BME design fellows is a program that guides students towards real world use cases and design projects
• The courses that Mark runs reminds Chris of "automatic job offers" that Chris has heard about for classes like those taught by former guest Larry Sears (at CWRU). Also SMPS design courses at UT Dallas and microarchitecture courses like those taught at University of Michigan.
• Teaching the skills of troubleshooting / debug
• Putting together circuits like Legos
• There are difficulties when teaching students with various levels of experience, namely how deep to go on any particular subject and how much background to provide.
• Mark has been flipping a circuit course on its head, instead prompting students with ideas like "how do you capture bio signals electronically and pull them into a microcontroller"
• Tools of the trade for Mark's courses include
  • KiCad
  • ngspice (built in to KiCad)
  • Jupyter notebooks
  • VS code
  • Git
  • Zephyr
• Talking about power as an intuition builder, as opposed to currents or voltages
• V&V requires that you have a quality management system (QMS)
• IEC60601
• Going through companies that have  QMS can be a shorter path for bringing a device to market
• Even face shields needed to go through that process when COVID hit
• Firmware and embedded in BME at graduate level
• Mark and students in BME Design Fellows course have been working on a Tympanometer, targeted at resource constrained industries
• Mark also teaches students how to use Zephyr, as opposed to how most educational programs migrate towards arduino
• A challenge for teaching Zephyr is the devicetreed
• They target Nordic Semiconductor parts, which have great support and educational resources
• Mark experienced a "vertical learning curve" when first migrating designs to Zephyr a few years ago
• Complicating things is that most students haven't coded in C, if they have done much code at all
• Teaching how to lock to a particular version with Zephyr manifests
• Using CI/CD for automated builds
• Focusing on state machines early on, using Zephyr's state machine framework (SMF)
• All of Mark's courses are on github under his username mlp6
• Teaching stack vs heap
• Mark only ever has taken one official progrmming course
• The benefits of experiential learning
• Accreditation is a constant challenge with non-standard courses and testing
• Duke is taking retrospective and prospective looks at the space of education
• Problem sets are moot these days
• Mark gave a great example about teaching a student about Bode Plots
• "Thats a trick problem" is something Mark hears wrt testing (when it's definitely not)
• "Getting the reps in" is an important concept in educational contexts, and something Chris really resonates with
• Building open ended problems vs closed
• The more open ended a problem, the more time it take to grade / evaluate
• TI-85 / 83 / 92 calculators
• Jupyter notebooks as a way to track progress and have students show their work
• More about the tympanometer project
• They have been working with Duke hospital, a major benefit for Mark and his BME colleagues
• Continuous middle ear infection that causes scarring that causes lifelong loss
• Sound reflection under vacuum is an indicator that more testing is needed
• The key innovation is making it lower cost and allow a layperson to do the screening to hand off a child to get more screening at a pro clinic
• BME Design Fellow students getting to design the various parts of the design
• They have multiple sources of funding: private, nih, etc
• Value engineering in medical space
• Mark points out the philosophical question on whether you can reduce costs by reducing testing ... but thinking about whyat that takes to satisfy that need
• Find Mark online
  • mlp6 on Github
  • His Duke homepage
  • tymp project article
  • Find him on LinkedIn
  • Duke BME design fellows / on LinkedIn

But Barry is also an electronics hobbyist and vintage HP and Tek oscilloscope and vintage computer enthusiast. He visited the EEVBlog lab and sat down with Dave for an impromptu discussion about all sorts of things.

https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2005/marshall/facts/

• Davide is an engineer working on Battery Management Systems at Elithion
• He got into writing and editing books via a postcard sent to him after he gave a talk
• For many years he was an editor at Artech house
• He works on Lithium BMS systems for large setups
• How do young engineers learn about connectors, but for tribal knowledge within larger companies?
• Digikey catalog is a good search for connectors overall
• Industrial cinch by Harting
• Should you design a custom connector ("no")
• Davide also built and maintains an online tool for finding connectors called Identiconn
• Fretting is when vibration causes a connector to fail
• Davide had to go to Bell Labs docs to look up some specs
• Chris remarked that Identiconn is a McMaster (Carr) style browsing experience
• Vendors divide based on how the fields are set up, because that is actually logical for them selling parts. It's harder for finding/discovering components though.
• On distributor sites, the connectors are grouped by how they were bought
• Chris asked Davide about things that have gone wrong in his career with connectors
• FFC doesn't connect back into the socket after the tab is ripped away
• ribbon cable vs ffc, CIC vs FPC
• IDC - insulation displacement connector
• Davide has filled in with generated terms where there are no defined language for a family/type of connector, such as with "bump idc" connectors
• "dual beam?
• Chris and Davide did a joint search for the high density CM4 connector that mounts the Raspberry Pi module to another board
• Gender of connectors (note: there is a great discussion about the historical nature of using gender for connectors in the book)
• Pin vs plastic gender
• Shrouded vs enshrouded
• gaziatea (sic) - poem from the 1800
• USB type A connector
• Self mating
• APC7 - self mting connector
• Anderson connectors
• TNC BNC search
• PFFE for the dielectric on a BNC/TNC
• Magnetic connectors with pogo pins
• Example connector from Hyte
• Crimps were designed in the 50s

• The source of having so many power connectors is ... imperialism? tahiti / fiji / nz all have different connectors
• Why antennas are male/female is...money? And regulatory silliness via the FCC
• Davide has also written about and is working on lithium ion batteries
• A sodium ion battery book (self published, unlike the LiIon books) should be out next year
• The Connector Book is self published. Your purchase directly supports Davide's work...and you get the web tools for free!
• "peak lithium"
• What is required when refining sodium for batteries?
• The voltage range and charging needs are different for Sodium Ion. For instance, the range goes from 4V to 2V
• Find Davide on his various websites, on LinkedIn, on StackExchange, and on reddit

• Capacitors go pop on Dave's audio setup, the Presonus monitors
• Ground loops causing HDMI cable sparking
• Chris was watching Jetman videos and got an 'Is that real?' from the kid. We find ourselves asking the same with all the AI generated video these days.
• Fight between mehdi/electroboom and walter lewin about KVL
• Arduino bought by Qualcomm! They also released the Arduino Uno Q, a single board computer running Debian that also has a beefy microcontroller running Zephyr
• Daves post on X about the purchase
• Arduino switched to Zephyr
• A new enabler of this complex mix of embedded, linux, AI, and ML is a software offering from Arduino called App lab
• Spacey
• Hardware meetup - ACES 
• Veritasium is PE owned now
• Chris will be going to a Tektronix event for new gear and past guest Alan Wolke (W2AEW) is giving a class
• Chris has been rebooting his website to follow the ideas of the Small Web
• Follow #electronicscreators on YouTube to not be subject to algorithmic steering
• Chris has been getting into gridfinity after discussing it a few shows ago.
• Altium changed their pricing again...but it might be lower? Hard to tell
• Check out the features coming to KiCad in v10
• YOLO = "You Only Look Once", Chris learned about it from OpenMV

• Simulation is critical when designing analog devices based on a PDK from the fab
• Parasitics are significant, especially with new nodes having upwards of 16 metal layers
• Chris complained about a class where the professor made them draw planar structures with graph paper with colored pencils
• Large fabs on leading edge nodes have 1800 page textbook of rules
• Because the constraints get tighter, that book gets longer for each node
• 2 nm mass production on finfet currently with TSMC
• 22 was the last classic cmos
• Finfet, looks like a devil
• 'gate all around' / nanosheet
• CFET (complementary field effect transistor) is next
• Joren really gets Maxwells Equations...as you have to at super high speeds
• SOFICS are making phy's / IP blocks
• Amplifiers that are DC to 50 GHz
• Making a datasheet for the resulting IP block
• Joren got his PhD working on millimeter wave applications
• It's all just physics
• Using coils to impedance match between layers
• Reflecting off of different materials at angles is Snells law (not lorentz equation) and that extends to different materials at different wavelengths
• Cables are very lossy at 100 GHz...dBs per cm
• Parasitics impact every part of the design process
• Wireline community - name for the high speed interfaces, including research in the space
• Most transistor threshhold voltages that Joren works with are ... 750 mV!
• Voltage dependent drc rules
• Electromigration - holes in wires from electrons
• ESD is a big part of the business, and a large source of parasitics
• New product development for IP blocks
• Working with customers and Foundry at the 2 nm node
• Design companies need to be paying 100s of thousands to software providers
• After, it goes to spice and schedmatic
• Joren decides whether to jump in on layout
• LVS - layout vs schematic
• Parasitic extraction (spice netlist)
• PDKs define how you can do the layout stage
• Lower cost tools exist but more expensive tools have tooling that tells you when you're violating DRC
• 3 main vendors
  • Cadence
  • Synopsis
  • Siemens (Calibre)
• Foundries soemtimes only support one tool
• Doing test wafers  allows testing of structures. They often get MPW at a discount from the fab (since they're often testing new processes as well)
• How do they test with packaging options?
  • 'low speed' can be die bonded or pcb mounted
  • high speed does on wafer probing (with veeeery expensive probes)
• Check out Sofics.com for more info on the company. They also have a blog with a great name.
• Follow or connect with Joren on LinkedIn

• Jerry's Background and Book Motivation: Jerry shares his quick history, moving from the Boston area to San Jose (Silicon Valley) and eventually to San Diego, where he has worked across diverse sectors including consumer electronics, aerospace, defense projects, DARPA research, and medical electronics. His book focuses on how to develop robust systems, providing guidance that is timeless rather than applications manuals that quickly become outdated.
• The Analog Problem: Although modern systems may be digital end-to-end, Jerry emphasizes that the predominant causes of failure and design difficulties are often analog in nature. Academic study often teaches ideal signals but neglects real-world issues like inductance, noise, and cross-coupling.
• Consulting Experience & Troubleshooting: Jerry discusses being called in to fix systems that failed strenuous regulatory testing for medical devices, where reliability is first and foremost (similar to an aerospace way of thinking). Failures often stemmed from basic issues like a lack of ESD protection, absence of error correction in data streams, insufficient detection of errors, and common mode noise rejection problems.
• High-Speed Data and Signal Integrity: At high data rates, communication becomes a "communications channel problem," not truly a digital one. When bits are underneath a tenth of a nanosecond, the communication turns into multiple standing wave transitions. The two primary limits on performance are rise and fall times and distance traveled.
• Real-World Applications: Jerry has worked extensively on medical devices, including early-generation Dexcom glucose monitoring systems (two on-body monitors and a hospital insulin pump/monitor), and a wearable EEG monitor. He also worked on a system that required packing five video cameras into an endoscope distal head, measuring 11 mm in diameter and 13 mm long.
• Architecting Systems and Identifying Bottlenecks: When starting a new project, Jerry suggests defining needs and interfaces and looking at the system as a black box. Engineering time should focus on the bottleneck—the hardest part of the system. For medical implantables, this might be minimizing power consumption down to virtually nothing, which could take up 90% of the effort.
• Power System Design: Jerry advises purchasing commercial AC-to-DC converters due to competitive pricing. He notes that switching supplies (buck converters) commonly introduce noise that can lead to EMI failures or corrupt sensitive analog front ends. A classic case of "digital thinking in an analog scenario" is when a sensitive analog front end is powered by a noisy switching converter.
• Working with Embedded Teams: Jerry prefers guiding embedded teams toward "self-discovery," using bench time and empirical measurement (such as comparing grounds on a scope) to demonstrate non-ideal connections and grounding issues. He advises against the "seagull manager" approach.
• Grounding Best Practices: For integrated circuits (chips), designs must be fully differential because securing a good hard ground reference is impossible. On singular circuit boards, a common uncut ground plane (dedicated ground plane, often multiple layers stitched together with vias) is the recommended approach. Cutting the ground plane is discouraged as it can create a slot antenna, increasing the signal radiating from the board by about 7 dB. Jerry has published rules on grounding.
• Engineering Intuition vs. LLMs: Jerry notes that intuition is gathered through painful learning experiences and guidance from experienced designers. He expresses concern over the reliance on LLMs (Language Learning Models), which, while improving, can confidently provide incorrect answers, especially regarding complex topics like signal grounding.
• Limits to Moore’s Law: CMOS scaling is approaching physical limits, likely unable to go below 10 or 11 nanometers. Modern performance gains are achieved through more parallel processing, not significantly faster clock rates, which have plateaued around 5 GHz due to parasitics and timing limitations. Jerry’s article discusses this topic.
• RISC Architectures: The industry benefits from migrating to RISC (Reduced Instruction Set Computing) architectures (like ARM) because they eliminate useless architecture and transistors associated with complex instruction sets (like x86).

• Tim's past appearances and previous work
  • Discussing Tomu on 375
  • Discussing Fomu on 456.3
  • Discussing the open source PDK on 501
  • Tim’s previous work at Google involved releasing a manufacturable open-source PDK (Process Development Kit), which contains the fundamental information needed to create integrated circuits.
  • Key open-source tools discussed include OpenROAD (a backend compiler for IC design) and Open Lane (an end-to-end suite turning chip descriptions (RTL) into manufacturing data (GDS)). Andreas had been on the show talking about his work on OpenROAD. Not discussed on the show but after Efabless went away, Open Lane has been replaced with LibreLane.
  • Efabless, a VC-backed startup, shut down in early 2025 due to investor disagreements. Efabless previously provided pooled manufacturing access (similar to OSH Park for PCBs) using the SKY130 process from Skywater in Minnesota.
  • A Skywater run costs $200k–$300k, which Efabless divided by 40 to reach roughly a $10k price point per slot.
• Tiny Tapeout
  • Matt Venn's Tiny Tapeout program further subdivides the manufacturing costs, making it the cheapest way to create custom silicon, typically costing around $300 per design.
  • Tiny Tapeout lowers the barrier to entry, allowing people to "just try it and see if you like it," similar to writing a "hello world" program.
  • The program has already processed almost 3,000 projects, demonstrating high community demand when costs are low.
  • Despite limitations, advanced projects are possible: a developer taped out a Linux capable SOC using open-source tools and the Tiny Tapeout space.
• Introducing Wafer Space
  • Tim started Wafer Space, based in Singapore, to provide community access to open-source manufacturing after Efabless ceased operations.
  • Wafer Space focuses on the GF180MCU PDK (Global Foundries 180 nm process), which is a much cheaper technology manufactured in Singapore.
  • The core offering is a low-volume production run: $7,000 USD gets you 1,000 chips back. This volume is enough for prototyping and shipping a small product (e.g., 500 units).
  • The design envelope area is 3.8 x 5 mm (20 mm squared) using the 180 nm process.
  • Interested parties should sign up via the Crowd Supply page.  The deadline for purchase is the November 28th and submissions are due by December 3rd, with delivery by March 15th.
• Manufacturing & Packaging
  • By default, customers receive bare silicon die
  • Tim is working with PCB manufacturers (like JLC PCB, PCB Way, Seed Studio) to offer Chip on Board (COB) wire bonding assembly onto custom PCBs (think black epoxy blob on a PCB)
  • COB packaging is significantly cheaper (sub-$2) than standard packaging houses (which often charge around $7 per chip).
  • This approach also provides faster iteration speed, as PCB manufacturers offer quick turnaround times (sometimes 3 days) compared to typical packaging houses (3 months)
• Getting Started & Resources
  • If you are new to chip design, starting with Tiny Tapeout's click and drag tools is highly recommended. Matt Venn previously talked/sang about Siliwiz
  • More advanced tools include Verilog and VHDL (coding style) or KLayout and Magic (drawing shapes, similar to PCB design).
  • To follow the project or seek help, join the Wafer Space Discord
  • New services offering open-source silicon manufacturing include IHP (Europe/130 nm) and Chip Foundry (US/Skywater), increasing ecosystem resiliency.
• Website: Wafer.space
• Sign up on the CrowdSupply campaign

• Todd was on Episode 194 of The Amp Hour, when he was consulting in the art and design space and building instruments like Where the Party At (WTPA). He was designing 'robot doors' for Calvin Klein's house, discussed last time.
• Through Andy Reitano, Todd learned about a role at Lockheed Martin (a US defence company) working on sonar for submarines.
• "What a good job is"
  • Fun
  • Lucrative
  • Skills / teach you
• Todd, Andy, and other Lockheed Martin friends worked on the VEC9 discussed in ep194
• Clearance was required to work on sonar
• Military electronics had some differences from his past work, but Todd was interestingly complementary of requirements driven design / waterfall
• Chris and Todd were hanging out in a bar before he moved over to working on space and Todd mentioned he wanted to be Zefram Cochrane and do interesting things that matter (in space).
• Star Trek First Contact (gah, I said generations)
• Past guest Shawn Meehan talked to Todd and that's how he started working at the "stealth space startup" at the time
• Astra
• HBO (not Netflix) special called Wild Wild Space
• Other past guests of the show who were at Astra include Charles Aylward and Jeri Ellsworth
• Silicon Valley Startup
• "When the heavens went on sale" (book)
• Commercial space by SpaceX
• Rocket Lab was second
• "Fail on stage"
• Booster state of that rocket motor control
• Electric turbo pump
• Delphin engine
• Cryogenic / feedback was hard
• Alameda indoor test facility
• Meant to fit in shipping container (8x8.5x40 ft)
• System design and market requirements (launches don't want small rockets)
• Working remote
• No place like home Jim Williams essay
• Leaving Astra
• Staying in the trenches
• Rocket Lab
• 3rd stage "Kick stage, now known as "Photon"
• Things you can work on in space
  • Radios
  • Sensors
  • Power
• Electric propulsion (EP)
• Apollo fusion - Alex Zannos (Contemporary) and Mike Cassidy (CEO)
• After working on fusion didn't have legs, they switched to working on Hall effect thrusters
• "Low earth orbit is 50% of the way to anywhere in the solar system"
• Rocket equation
• Stage fires then falls off
• Kick stage is 3rd stage
• Accelerating an ion beam
• Delta V book
• Rocket efficiency
• "Seconds of ISP" How much mass do you use to go distance
• Asteroid mining
• Who buys EP?
• SpaceX built their own Argon thruster
• Torque rods / reaction wheels
• Apollo successfully pivoted
• Acquired by Astra space / finished the apollo constellation engine
• In 2022, Todd and his cofounder Mark Hopkins started Starlight Engines after some initial proof points and then fundraising
• Had opinions about EP
• Goebels and Katz textbooks about EP
• Busek electric propulsion is a family business that has tried all kinds of EP. Run by Vlad Ruby & son Pete.
• Starlight is based on solid Zinc propellant
• Traditionally it's Xenon
• "The honda civic of hall effect sensor systems"
• The atomic mass of Zinc is light
• "Lickable EP"
• Discharge converter runs the ion beam
• Custom magnetics
• 300W - 800W
• 28V spacecraft bus
• "Plume divergence"
• Need to go from solid to gas
• Cathode is a thermionic emitter "Like a tube amp", it emits to boil off electrons
• Zinc gets caught in electron cloud, knocks an electron off to make ions, ejected from a positively charged plate nearby.
• Novel propellent is a differentiator
• Starlight had a scrappy factor, like they built their own vacuum chamber (for 15K!)
• The device is not known to be operational in space yet (they sell it but don't operate it, so it'd be tough to know)
• "Give the first one away"
• Have sold 4 propulsion systems
• Muon space needed a propulsion system and instead decided to buy the company. They weren't put off by "two guys in a garage and contractors".
• Muon builds things like fire detection satellites
• For more info about their past work and see pictures of the plumes, check out Starlightengines.com
• To see the new things they'll be working on, check out Muon space

• Andrew was first on episode 131 of The Amp Hour
• CircuitHub has a partnership with Worthington Assembly
• Worthington and CircuitHub host the Pick Place Podcast
• Mimicing silicon manufacturing
• Common parts library
• Setting the factory up to have only 50k SKUs in house for speed of loading / attrition
• Driving people to 2000 parts was the original intent, but didn't hit the mark
• Level of production needs to be high
• Many parts need to work in conjunction
  • Reflow
  • PnP
  • Throughhole
  • Selective soldering
  • Inspection
• Need to solve for the whole setup. Making smt 10x better doesn't make overall 10x better
• Starlink manufcaturing localy
• PCB fabs in the US, 50 left, getting rolled up under Private Equity (as are things like machine shops)
• AI with VCs
• How it impacts the electronics industries
• KiCad
• More AI stuff
• Automation on checking
• Still humans involved
• PDKs for chip companies
• File checking / JLC
• Types of customers
  • 10 largest companies on the planets
  • It's individuals who order and try it out, that often becomes a repeat business thing
  • Customers / types of boards / size of orders
  • More startups who also want production
• Future serving lower cost areas
• Proto service 2-4 layer black soldermask (unlisted)
• See the CircuitHub capabilities
• Going high volume
• People making weekly or monthly units and spreading it out
• Spinning up custom in-house high volume
• Flattenting the price curve
• Tariffs
• New customers approaching them because of it
• Can consumer be done in the US?

• Matt has been reverse engineering a "smart" smoker controller that talks back to AWS IOT
• Jeff Geerling talking about his dishwasher
• Storing private keys on the device??
• Threat models
• Key rotation
• What is the best case scenario for an IoT device?
• Secure boot / trust zone
• Keys encrypt flash storage
• Chris has designed in the ATECC608 before
• Replacing Certificate Authority (CA) cert in grill firmware
• Matt has a Linux hardware / reverse engineering background
• Flash is always external
• Ghidra / idapro / binwalk
• Security cameras are 99% linux based (battery based cameras might be embedded)
• Best practices
• Encrypted firmware
• hidden uart / jtag
• Keys
• Are linux devices "worth more" to a security researcher?
• CVSS risk scoring system
• Attack vector
• Vulnerabilities are better if it can be a remote executed
• Linux devices have more compute
• Bluetoothe LE
• Ability to enumerate
• Scale reverse engineering
• Chris has discussed the silliness of a bluetooth toothbrush on the show before
• Tools / Software of the trade
  • xgeku firmware reader
  • picoemp
  • PCBite
  • Saleae
  • SDR USRP B200
  • Universal radio hacker
• Stick-to-it-ness
• Matt just came back from hardwear.io, one of his new favorite conferences
• Find Matt at the embedded systems village at DEF CON
• Follow Matt via his YouTube channel
• Matt has a new IoT Security newsletter starting up

• Introduced by Mike Harrison, past guest of the show
• Fluid pendant
• Volumetric display
• London hackspace

• https://matthias-research.github.io/pages/tenMinutePhysics/index.html
• FLIP in Blender
• CHNT36ta Pick and place doing 0201
• Precision Clock
• Sewing machine (check out that GIF!)
• Secret life of machines - Tim Hunkin
• Isaac Singer
• Tim has many Lathe projects on the hardware projects page
• Flag Steam Engine
• Learn how to machine from MrPete222's YouTube channel
• Schlock Mercenary (Comic)
• Sprite tm on The Amp Hour
• Gameboy advance link cable
• Writing a gameboy emulator 
• Emulators got him into electronics
• No$ ("nocash") emulator
• AVR instruction set
• MIDI
• CNLohr on The Amp Hour
• https://mitxela.com/projects/slide2
• Forcing
• brainfuck (language)
• quop
• movfuscator
• Puzzles
• Spacechem (Game)
• Zach Barth of Zachtronics on The Amp Hour 
• babaisu
• LED errings

• watchdog timer allows ridiculously low power
• 1 way loader 
• autobauding
• Find all of Tim's projects on mitxela.com
• Watch the latest videos on the mitxela youtube

• Driving back from canberra
• Ben Krasnow makin' magnets!
• Bluetooth videos

• Sam has always been interested in art...and power engineering
• He primarily works in Blender and has been for 5-6 years
• Inputs and outputs
• Starting from Altium / KiCad for eCAD
• Blender doesn't accept step files, it works with meshes like STL
• KiCad -> Blender is a good flow, as there are add-ons to import KiCad
• Making a good visulalization is all about lighting, materials
• Building library of models
• Modeling magnetic fields
• Research in wireless power
• openEMS vtk format
• The marjority of tooling is glued together with python
• ElectroMag Nodes - Sam's tool - $1
• Right hand rule
• Developing intuition
• Elmer finite element solver
• Past guest Katerina Galitskaya also visualized RF and talked about the differences of testingi n a chamber vs building a visualization
• FastHenry is inductance tool that was created in 80s at MIT for wirebonds. Didn't have a visualization front end, like SPICE
• 3D whiteboard
• Using Blender to prototype and then taking it to other tools (CST, Ansys)
• Validating on the bench with an impedance analyzer
• Simulating power loss is difficult
• Quality factor
• "CAD is too perfect"
• Adding surface imperfections
• Node system is similar to simulink, adding blocks (Chris also thought this sounded like the effects in Davinci Resolve)
• Lighting
• Making the background dark means you don't need to have far field details
• Tutorials
• Blender Guru - how to make a donut
• Sam's video about how to draw components on a PCB in Blender
• Doing the same with Geometry nodes in Blender
• Ability to create things procedurally
• How to create ICs in Blender
• Using LLMs for python glue code
• What is a shader?
• HardOps tool, simplifies workflow (shuffle button)
• Visualizing an Inverted F antenna in Blender
• Remembering that videos are just still frames in order
• Electric fields propagating on the antenna itself
• Radiated electric fields (red and blue and black)
• OpenEMS generates GBs of data
• Blender geomtry goes out to OpenEMS so it's geometrically linked
• What if it was a ceramic antenna instead of a metal inverted F?
• Simulating 60 GHz from a radar chipset
• Meshing - sample points in space
• simulating points in time
• Impacts of stubs / squares on microwaves
• Human Hand Interaction with 60GHz Electromagnetic waves
• SAR simulations - how much heat do you generate
• Simulating motor windings on a PCB
• The above was a collaboration with past guest Carl Bugeja
• When to switch from near field (electro) vs far field (openEMS)
• Calculating values with inductance calculator
• FastHenry tool on Github
• Sam's work on artstation
• ZS smart watch

• Fast track if listeners want to get better at this art
  • Learn blender - donut
  • KiCad -> Blender reference
  • Play with geometries nodes (ElectroMag Nodes, Fast Henry)
• Find Sam on social
  • LinkedIn
  • Twitter/X
  • YouTube
  • Instagram
  • EEVblog forum

This episode was recorded Monday the 12th, which has implications on discussions.

• Dave recently returned from Melbourne for Dave's recent visit to Electronex.
• Dave saw past guest Scott Williams there (he has been interviewed by both Dave and Chris). Scott's company Xentronics is also a Golioth partner
• They discussed service providers in the electronics industry at including turnkey solutions (concept to production and marketing) versus services only (firmware, PCB layout, CAD).
• The choice of show for a service provider might depend on the customer vertical (e.g., medical expo for medical device design).
• Farmers are described as rough clients due to being cost-constrained, needing durable solutions for harsh environments, and being unforgiving of downtime.
• The Australian Manufacturing Week was unexpectedly enormous, dwarfing the electronics show in scale and attendance, with lines up to 40 minutes long just to get in.
• The manufacturing show featured "Heavy Metal" manufacturing, like laser cutters, sheet metal benders, and giant machines cutting thick steel, which Dave found more exciting than the electronics demos.
• They discussed the scale of manufacturing equipment, comparing it to shows like IMTS in Chicago with multi-story machining centers and machines weighing hundreds of tons.
• Australia manufactures things like steel, large steel structures (bridges), and large custom parts like excavator scoops.
• Dave is conducting environmental air quality tests in his office, measuring formaldehyde, CO2, and other factors. He has to run his air conditioning for one of the test conditions.
• The environmental monitor measures temperature, pressure, humidity, VOCs, noise, carbon dioxide, formaldehyde, PM2.5 particulate matter, and radiation. The radiation sensor uses a tube requiring 381 volts.
• XKCD graphic showing relative radiation
• Dave observes large formaldehyde spikes every time he opens his door, which go down within about 10 minutes. His CO2 levels are typically 800-900 ppm.
• The AC unit cycling is visible in the humidity measurements.
• Chris asks about the availability of affordable VOC sensors now. Dave believes his monitor uses a common sensor like the BME680.
• Chris explains that the availability of affordable VOC sensors is linked to FEMA trailers after Hurricane Katrina, where high formaldehyde levels caused illness, leading to regulations and subsequently more affordable sensors. Modern VOC sensors often measure gas resistivity in ohms.
• Some PM2.5 sensors use a fan and a laser to detect particles.
• Dave saw small desktop lathes at the manufacturing show and was tempted to buy one for $800.
• Chris explains the difference between a mill and a lathe. Potential uses for a lathe are discussed, including making knobs.
• Chris advises against buying a personal machining tool like a lathe or mill unless you need parts immediately, suggesting using online services instead, as getting $800 of value from occasional use is difficult.
• Dave jokingly suggests a lathe might be useful for "zombie apocalypse manufacturing", or more darkly, for making gun barrels.
• Chris mentions his past experience with a mill, which he traded for a 3D printer kit. He now prefers "it just works" solutions.
• They discuss receiving free 3D resin printers and the difficulty of finding uses for them unless you are already skilled in 3D modeling.
• Discussion shifts to the recent drop in tariffs between China and the US. Dave believes this will lead to lots of manufacturing coming back to the US, citing announcements from car companies and others (but providing no sources). Chris found this CBS article after the fact, but it's light on details.
• NPR covered how tariffs are impacting Digikey and Thief River Falls
• Chris is skeptical that the tariff drops or initiatives like the CHIPS Act will cause significant, long-term shifts in the global supply chain, especially for components like capacitors or packaged semiconductors.
• The complexities of building fabs and the long lead times are mentioned in relation to the CHIPS Act.
• Chris recommends a YouTube channel about shipping and logistics and mentions MarineTraffic.com for tracking live global shipping data.
• Dave mentions issues with Bluetooth data dropouts and incorrect values on a new Brymen BM787 multimeter.
• Dave recently made a video about Test Controller, a free Java-based program that automates hundreds of test instruments (multimeters, power supplies, loads) via serial interfaces. It allows scripting and custom driver creation.
• Dave considers using Test Controller and multiple instruments with his microscope PC for overlaying data on video.
• Chris introduces the concept of "vibe coding," which means letting AI do the coding. You act as a product manager providing requirements and feedback.
• Dave has used AI for coding before and is interested in using it for his next project due to infrequent coding leading to needing to relearn tools. He suggests using it for a simple timer project, especially for annoying tasks like generating fonts.
• Chris is using AI for a location-sharing web app prototype for a meetup. He describes the experience of watching the AI modify files and interact with tools as "trippy". He uses "Claude credits" for this.
• They discuss AI as a new tool. Chris expresses concern about how students learning to code today will develop troubleshooting skills if AI does much of the basic work.
• Dave received a new piece of high-end test equipment: a Microtest Impedance Analyzer (model 6632). This is distinct from an LCR meter and can measure the entire frequency impedance sweep up to 10 MHz (for the model received).
• The impedance analyzer can be used to characterize components like PCB inductors, assess bypass capacitor performance on boards, or measure materials like piezoelectric substrates. It can also show admittance circles and DC bias characteristics.
• Chris mentioned that past guest Carl Bugeja would benefit from a tool like the impedance analyzer
• Dave notes the impedance analyzer is very specific and requires special fixturing. It supports open, short, and load compensation.
• Dave also recently received a heavy GW Instek AC power source, which can be used for power line simulation (adding spikes, dropouts, etc.) to test products.

• Colin has been on the show twice before
  • Episode 239 in 2015
  • Episode 552 in 2021
• Colin continues to publish/do research around side channel attacks
• Now he's targeting different ports / Jitter measurements
• JTAGulator
• RF Mixer
• Side channel with power
• Can you fix it on a chip?
• Targeting an SD Card port because there's a clock
• Other clocked things like displays / RF
• State of hardware security
• RPi episode (RP2350)
• OpenTitan 
• Root of Trust
• Episode with Laura Abbott from Oxide
• Open vs closed about security
• Guidelines for what to care about like in the ARM PSA
• UK gov't
• Lowrisc Sonata System
• CHERI / CHERIot
• Secure / non-secure
• Artix 7 FPGA
• Mouser bonded area
• Pick and place experiments
• Charm High / Neoden
• Failing on fast turn
• Person running production
• Recovering from Covid shortages
• Airtag teardown
• ESP32 HCI supposed vulnerability (and response)
• Colin is writing a book about small scale production
• Sign up to learn more about the book when its available!
• Students "Kids these days"
• ChatGPT in the classroom
• Check out Colin's blog for more info!

• Chris signed on to get solar installed
• He'll be taking advantage of Duke Energy's PowerPair, a program to get a bulk amount for the battery and ongoing payments to act as a virtual power plant.
• Telsa Powerwall 3 Teardown
• Australian politicians are proposing money for batteries for everyone in Australia
• Peter Walkinson batteries
• CATL batteries
• Back powering off a Chevy Bolt
• AC battery power
• Peaker plant
• Check out the rates for peak power in New South Wales (high!)
• Base load
• Chris is working on a new series for tiny hardware
• nRF52840
• With careful planning, it's possible to get a "0.4 mm pitch" (found out it's actually 0.35 mm!) onto the JLC 6 layer process because they now allow via in pad.
• Jumperless v5 episode (though as a reminder, we're giving away the OG versions, not the v5)
• Dave review of Jumperless (mailbag video)
• We are doing a 2025 listener survey and added some new questions
• Slow trigger 
• R&S version 
• Laminated cheat sheet
• Jeff Geerling Bosch video 
• The Tariffs in the US are an absolute mess. Since recording they have been downgraded, but they are definitely still going to have some outsized influece on the electronics world.
• Chris thinks that it makes more sense to race to the bottom of available parts (like the new $0.10 CH572 with Bluetooth), pay the tariff, and put in more time and effort on the software. Not that Chris is the intended audience, but also that it's not going to have the effect that is
• Ghostbusters song

• Michael and Chris usually see each other around the Zephyr booth at Embedded World, but not this year
• Antmicro continues to work on Zephyr, which targets hardware using Devicetree
• Renode
• Mult-node
• testing code
• aethero
• Data center in space
• Cosmic shielding corporation
• Tying the simulation to reality
• How do you know an actuation has happened
• RESD - Renode sensor data format
• Drone data example
• Finding and testing the variety of use cases
• Borderline criteria
• Fuzzing
• Kenning AutoML
• Anomaly detection on an MCU with Kenning
• Co-op example
• Adding
• System designer
• Environment al board
• Aerocore2 STM
• Camera
• Checking on the pin / assignment problem
• Supporting vendors that have good support / open source
• ADI plugins for Zephyr
• Root of Trust Caliptra
• Interested in Antmicro services and products? Check out offering.antmicro.com

• Check out the Jumperless v5 on Crowd Supply
• OG Jumperless Video
• This update shows a bunch of images with the breadboard off
• 3M whitelabels their breadboards (because of the adhesive?)
• Breadboard spring clips
• Spring clips (in 3D)
• Elecrow
• 369
• CH446Q, a clone of Zarlink MT88161
• FPAA
• Resistance of the traces
• BSky
• Schematic
• CLOSS network
• Power Op Amps
• +/- 9V supply
• Or just all the parts laid out in one pic
• Layers/routing
• Probe circuit
• Bus Pirate adapter
• Raspberry Pi adapter
• Interface
• Full color WJP 3d printing (and on X)
• Zephyr shells
• You can still buy these on CrowdSupply
• Repos
  • https://github.com/Architeuthis-Flux/JumperlessV5
  • https://github.com/Architeuthis-Flux/Jumperless
  • https://github.com/Architeuthis-Flux/breadWare
• Follow Kevin online
  • Bsky
  • Mastodon
  • Discord

• The last time the RPi team was on the show was about the RP1 (#648)
• The order of parts being released was RP2040->RP1->RP2350
• Check out the datasheet for the RP2350
• Learning from silicon
• Security and power states
• The part is a "Dual dual core"
• The Arm side is a Dual M33
• The RISC V side is a Hazard 3 processor, designed by Luke based on a previous processor called the Hazard 5
• HB5
• There is a mux on the core and you select which side you're going to use at boot
• There are 48 GPIO (but users always want more)
• Chris Boross (first time on the show) is on the commercial team. He's seing interesting applications for the RP2350 including devices that are using it for motor control.
• They also have seen the part used in satellites because mRAM or masked ROM is less susceptible to radiation errors
• The PIOs have changed, but are more evolutionary from the RP2040
• The PIO allows you to create state machines that process inputs without processor interventions, basically like tiny cores
• 2 cores - 8 total
• Interesting PIO applications
  • Luke still likes that DVI on 2040 that was discussed on the first episode they were on (#529)
  • CAN is possible
  • USB host / device
  • MII / RMII
  • ULPI - USB 2.0 Phy
• The core frequency only increased 133 MHz -> 150 MHz. There is tougher timing with the M33
• LVT - lower voltage threshhold
• 30 -> 40 pins
• There are now variants listed on the RP2350 product page (but not in mass production) that include flash in the SOM package
• RP2040 was one power domain
• "Powerman" (and of course AVR Man)
• Switched core
• AON - always on
• 32 kHz
• There is a C/C++ SDK that is the basis for other ports
• Security is a focus for the RP2350
• Bootrom in every chip
• Secure boot
• M33 features - secure / non-secure
• RISC V PMP
• RCP - Redundancy Coprocessor
• Raspberry Pi had a challenge / bounty for getting the secret out of the RP2350 OTP with secure boot
• One of the few silicon companies doing this sort of thing in public
• Past guest Aedan Cullen  was one of the hacks called "Hazardous threes". He gave a talk about it at 38C3
• Past guest Colin O'Flynn was also mentioned because collaboration around side channel attacks with the Chip Whisperer
• IOActive used a FIB - Fine Ion Beam - and passive voltage contrast to capture an impressive image of a decapped chip (see the RPi post)
• "Never want to see 'novel technique' in an email"
• Improving the RP2350 silicon
• How do you decide what to fix/leave?
• Can it be changed in metal/vias?
• SIO spinlock not being fixed
• Chicken Bit
• Filler cells are reprogrammable and help with fixes
• It costs approximately $50K per layer to change (ostensibly because of the high costs of masks)
• ULA - uncommitted logic array
• Die shrink doesn't seem to make sense
• Will keep making each chip as long as 40 nm fabs are around
• Thinking about the RP2040
• The easiest way to get started is to use a Pico (RP2040) or a Pico 2 (RP2350). Both have connectivity options as well.
• Raspberry Pi is now a public company! Doesn't change much other than the business scrutiny.

• Chris interviewed Stephen back in 2020 for his second episode of The Contextual Electronics Podcast. It was when Stephen was still working at Formlabs and the Lumen/Opulo were a glimmer in his eye.
• The Lumen v4 is a Benchtop Pick and Place machine that works with OpenPNP
• Where are we in relation to reprap?
• Powered feeders
• Videos about eeprom
• KiCad pos file
• Can reliably place 0402
• Lumen v4 product page
• Motherboard of v4
• Running Marlin FW
• Head has two heads/nozzles
• Compare the Lumen to other methods (hand placed, paying for assembly)
• OHM (Open Hardware Manufacturing) podcast
• What industries are open?
• Thea Flowers (of Winterbloom synth fame) just joined the team
• Microscope
• Other tools
• Space constraints
• Stephen does a great job talking through many experiments and upcoming features on his youtube channel
• Prototyping PCBs with a fiber laser 
• Micronix
• Making PCBs on a 3D printer (hack session with Stephen's former employer)
• Timon (Skerutsch) makes double sided PCBs by inserting enameled wire through drilled holes

• Miniturization and the limits of miniturization
• Price is a constraint
• Using standard PCB tech (off the shelf)
• Open source SIP
• Steps
  • Conventional pcbs / components
  • Silicon inductors embedded in boards
  • Bonded Bare dies / stacked
• Need volume to make it work
• Requirements to fit into ______
• iMX8 ULP - 0.4mm CSP
• SIP Footprint
• Module abstraction layer talk
• Framework laptop
• Software support / BSP
• SIP will be different than PiMX8
• Crowdsupply campaign launching 2-3 weeks and delivery in Dec/Jan
• OpenSource laptop
• CM4 vs PiMX8
• SPI Flash with backup partition
• Secure element SE050
• Footprint for coral tpu and Halo 8
• Trying to solve the problem of vision use cases
• Marketing using layout / products but also making money on it
• Katerina show
• Visualizing simulations
• Developing intuition
• OpenEMS
• Usability is based on python scripting
• Using Blender for heat map
• BVTKNodes uses .vtk file output
• Multiphysics solvers
• Things that drive Lukas
• For HDI, Thinking in 3D / 2.5D and being able to visualize
• Layers ranging from 4 to 18
• Any layer design for SIP
• Wurth electroncis for high density "any layer stackup"
• Article series on altium for the open laptop
• Follow Lukas on LinkedIn

Dan works for Inovor Technologies, an Australian company that designs and builds satellites entirely in-house!

Recently they designed and launched the aussie Kanyini satellite on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket https://www.inovor.com.au/missions/

They design and build their own Flight computers, ADCS systems, UHF radios, Battery modules and Solar Arrays in Australia.

• Chris started following Katerina's antenna posts on LinkedIn
• Monopole vs dipole
• Lower frequences are harder bc longer wavelength
• PCB size half of frequency
• Place antenta on the shorter side
• How to ruin your PCB
• When to go to a antenna engineer?
• Where will the device be?
• Antenna environment
• Start from vacuum, start adding elements
• Dummies in the lab. The one in the episode photo is a dummy head filled with liquid (?!)
• SAR - Specific Absorption rate
• Simulation vs lab work (dimensions)
• Anechoic chamber
• When to go with custom antenna?
• Buying off the shelf antenna?
• New Airpods with fancy 3D antenna
• Ben's video about laser sintered antennas
• MIMO / Beamforming
• the failed promises of 5G
• When to simulate
• Some open source programs out there ("EMSee"?)
• Simulating vs visualizing
• Most of the time it's not about vizualizing fields
• What is the iteration elements of the antenna?
• Satellite antenna design
• Good to go external
• Thinking about the dielectric const of case
• Follow Katerina on LinkedIn!

• Shawn will be transitioning out Developer Relations at Edge Impulse. He will now be building courses full time. (this was recorded before Shawn announced his departure)
• He want's to be like a Professor, which partially explains his signature bowtie
• Should people go into content? What about Developer Relations more specifically?
• New courses will include FreeCAD and 3D printing and will be published by Digikey
• Part design in FreeCAD
• 0.22 in Mango Jelly
• Learning modeling vs learning an actual program
• Scoffolding
• Making a Zephyr course
• Zephyr / Golioth training
• Ecosystem vs RTOS
• Workshop at Harvard
• Trying to train on hardware
• What should engineers know about ML
• Andrew Ng's course on Coursera
• Updated for NumPy / Python
• Understand Neural Networks
• Can treat them as a black box
• More important to understand statistics and data science
• Hot dog / not hot dog (silicon valley)
• Model zoos
• Hugging Face
• Coprocessing on U55 - U85
• ToorCamp
• Michael Cheich
• Robert Ferenec
• Marketing courses
• Running
• You can find Shawn as ShawnHymel on most social
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • Mastodon
  • Bluesky
  • TikTok
  • Instagram
• You can also check out his site, shawnhymel.com

• Midi pedals
• Old projects
• LED walls
• Dunning kruger
• Sonar scanner 
• Aliens
• Romulus
• Lifelong learning
• Beamforming
• Previously had worked on something similar in the medical field but didn't realize it was the same tech
• ESP32
• Gowin FPGA
• Video generation / crt control
• R2R 
• cnlohr videos for making PCBs
• ESP32 VGA
• PCB mill 
• Failing
• Tiny Tapeout bringing down costs like PCBs
• Jeri doing "home etching" (making silicon at home)
• Building the meme project  on TT02
• GIF construction set
• Almost like a ROM on board, on each clock it exposes the next byte on paralell output
• Luni hasn't submitted to each tiny tapeout but is building a new project
• Browser assembler that runs in the handheld gaming: "Luni-Asm"
• cpu + gpu to get vector output
• Bitluni live youtube / Bitluni - twitch happens Weds at 8 pm CEST
• Community helps
• Writing memory controllers
• Bus master because internal SRAM is so expensive
• Expense of flash/ram is in IP
• People running test structures the tiles
• FPGAs, Gowin - 9K standard up to 25k
• Gabriel / Lushay Labs - Tutorials for FPGAs
• HDMI connector
• Some IP blocks from Gowin
• Yosys support
• VS code tools and simulation
• Gowin FPGA designer
• Learning clock domains
• Moving back to art
• Demoscene came from the cracker scene
• Different categories / limits
• 4K category only allows 4K of memory for images and sound (generated)
• White demo competitions
• Contact
  • bitluni
  • github
  • twitch

(Due to illness and some life stuff happening, my recording setup was crap. Apologies. I also leaned heavily on Matt’s notes, so some of the following links will be out of order. Think of it like an ad hoc scavenger hunt…fun!)

• Matt was last on the show on episode 616, about 18 months ago
• Tiny Tapeout has continued, now working on it's 8th run. the 5th run is shipping soon.
• Uri Shaked made Wokwi compatible with making chip designs and then compiling them to verilog for later processing by open source tools
• 12 bit SAR ADC on TT07
• linux capable riscv
• Analog ASIC design with digital standard cells!
• We had previously posted Matt's review of 2023 and aims for 2024 
• Siliwiz
• ASIC inside synchrotron 
• Touring IHP (Germany) facilities
• Interview with Nordic Semi designer
• People are building analog structures on Tiny Tapeout
• There's a new course on Zero to Asic that will be about Analog (sign up for the waitlist)
• There are some new tools being developed
  • surfer  - browser based waveform
  • moosic - logic locking plugin for yosys
  • eqy - formal equivalence checking
• Matt will be doing a TT workshop at supercon 2024
• TT08 will have a demoscene competition - VGA and sound output - what’s the coolest thing you can fit in 1 tile? You have until Sept 6th 2024 to submit!
• Not discussed, but on the list and interesting!
  • Silicon Supply Chains with Ed Conway
  • An early analog design (temp sensor) on TT03
  • Get TT quality stickers

• Parker Dillman
• Stephen Kraig
• James Lewis

• A to Z book about KiCad
• fancygit
• lazygit
• gitlol
• Customer types
• Brno - 30% of electron microscopes
• What is changing in electron microscopes? Higher voltage, no noise
• Electrostatic steering
• Transitioning to freelancing
• Regulations for freelancer vs employer
• Petr is a prolific poster of electronics content on his LinkedIn
• Show your work - Austin Kleon
• 3 years to get first client
• 1 month buffer of posts on LinkedIn
• Building repetitions
• Outliers / 10000 hours
• Lists of projects
• Constraints helping new engineers trying to learn electronics
• 8x32 pixel displays
• Petr in Shenzhen
• Gallup - top strength is learning
• Personality types
• Contact
  • Get a free eBook about KiCad on beny-devices.eu
  • Follow Petr on LinkedIn

• Mistakes in house repair for partners
• Architectural Lighting
• Power quality
• Repairing a $4500 DAC
• Invisible computers
• Cal Newport on AI
• AI shortform
• USB C Spec
• Tester
• "50.0000 ohms"
• HDMI Layout guide (ADI)
• Bit Error Rate
• My voice is my passport
• Fake Dave
• Hackers
• War Games
• Captain Crunch no longer welcome at DEF CON
• Wifi (WLAN) Location API
• Polar Semi gets CHIPS act money

• CNLohr was on the last episode talking about the CH32V003 part and the CH32V003fun library
• Charlieplexed errings
• Fast iteration
• Lohr-a...LoRa...get it?
• LoRa

• Started in January 2024 with discussions with mustardtiger / Frank
• Charles had done Wifi long range before
• Also FM from ATTINY85
• Ethernet + AM
• Radio signals without radios
• USB
• Harmonics
• LolRa
• Upchirps / downchirps
• 903.825 - 903.975 mhz
• Michael Ossmann talk
• LoRa doesn't do code matching
• JP Norair talking about LoRaWAN / DASH7
• Tool / emulator for the airwaves
• 3 lines of the repo
• Tool to create tables
• There are two 2 lookup tables (up and downchirps)
• Table is different for differnet spreading factors and base frequencies
• Andreas Spiess LoRa/LoRaWAN distance attempts
• Spreading Factor -- can't past SF10 on this setup for unknown reason
• AirSpy
• Matt Knight
• LoRaWAN -- protocol vs network
• The Things Network / Helium
• Activation by personalization
• Nesting dolls of encryption
• New parts CH32V002 (also, -005, -006. -007)
• Charles is excited about the op amp on the CH32V006 that has 64 MHz GBW
• CH32V203 - 144 MHz - $0.24, has usb xcvr
• CH32X035 is self clocking - best low cost option for USB
• All are supported in library now
• Community - CNLohr discord
• Porting examples for the parts using the technical reference manual
• MNIST database - handwriting recognition system
• Announcement post on CNX about the new parts
• It's possible to hook up parts directly through the 1 pin SWIO, so you can hot-load firmware
• Writing code onto a "scratch pad"
• Want to see more CNLohr experiements online?
  • Youtube.com/cnlohr
  • discord: cnlohr reach out for invite
  • Github

• Chris will be at Embedded World 24 next week
• Bluetooth standard messages like HT, HR
• Early bluetooth devices (were terrible)
• WiBree (?)
• Sequans deal with Renesas fell apart
• There was a Sequans modem on the PyCom FiPy
• The low power ISM network Chris couldn't remember was SigFox
• Synopsis acquired Ansys (back in January)
• Here comes the flood of Plugin Hybrids
• Dave's sick car - 2010 Nissan dualis - Second channel
• New Espressif ESP32-P4 is getting ready to release
• Bitluni makes custom silicon (spoilers!)
• Past guest Pete Bevelaqua has a new Kickstarter where he's passing power through a window (up to 30 mm thick)
• Top 10 Hobby Components (PartsBox) - submitted by former guest Jan Rychter
• Top 5 transistor video
• New BealgleBoard.org board isn't in the BeagleBone form factor

Welcome Carl Bugeja!

• Carl lives and works in Malta
• He got started with robotics at his university
• Carl recently announced he would be launching a new company
• The company is called Microbots and they will sell components and kits for building similar projects to what Carl shows on his channel
• BigHero6 reference
• https://microbots.io/products/flatflap
• Max PCB temp is 130C
• Driven by series resistance of coil
• Tg value of PCBs
• A circuit that can solder itself
• How hot can a Flex PCB get?
• Batch vs raster
• Do you math?
• Tryng to get the perfect temperatures and dealing with flex materials
• Dealing with manufacturing differnces
• Scanning PCB Coils with X-Rays
• Sending PCB specs
• Incoming inspection and testing
• Testing boards with resistance
• Time flap produce
• User testing
• Drive circuits - How do you evaluate?
• Don't build your own H Bridge
• Optimizing for size
• Is Carl looking for other features?
• Building libraries for driver
• Foldable 4 wheeled robot , an all one PCB
• ESP32-C3, connected to playstation remote
• Boston Dynamics uncanny valley
• Gathering on social
• Top down vs bottom up (start at the top)
• Prior to YouTube, Carl worked at a startup
  • Drones - 2 prop
  • Bluetooth tags
• Later he moved to the automotive industry
  • Concept vehicles
  • Software
• What's in Malta?
• Building a remote electronics business
• Remote actuators on a PCB
• Microbots Flexar Driver
• Driving down the price per cell
• Similar to how they drove down the cost of LCD displays
• Pixel, voxel, moxel, maxel?
• Flipdots
• PCB Actuation
• Find Carl on YouTube and Instagram, and check out his work on the new Microbots site!

Welcome Pallav Aggarwal of CAPUF Embedded!

• Chris enjoyed Pallav's series on learning the ch32v003 - fun vs HAL
• Ambiq Apollo
• Decision trees when considering hardware vs firmware
• Expensive to do software and stuff
• Order some of the boards Pallav created on Evelta
• India ecosystem for hw
• India industry
• CAPUF team size
• Pallav shares teardowns on YouTube
• reducing complexity
• Reviewing customer designs and removing 40%
• RP2040 in usb debuggers
• Efficiency consulting
• Over indexing on form and fit during rev 1
• Troubleshoot: Joulescope / Saleae / Static analyzer
• Pallav has a page where he tracks AI tools for PCB creation
• There's another page where he tracks AI modules / chips
• DevRel as a service
• Nordic
• Check out Capuf.in for more info on Pallav's consulting or reach out via email

• Promise of smart home
• Electronic keypad
• Keyfob
• Proxmark
• Oral B bluetooth toothbrush
• Braun toothbrush teardown
• Solar road shutdown
• Smart mains socket tester
• ch32v003 testing success
• Samy keylogger
• Startups in Germany (can any German listeners verify?)
• Diyode mag is shutting down
• KiCad 8 was released! James Lewis did a good overview video
• SPICE in CAD
• Composite amplifier
• Zephyr 3.6 release
• Altera

• Nabu Casa is a commercial venture that supports the open source Home Assistant (HA) project
• Hardware
• Home assistant allows your smart home to not require an outside connection, which is crucial to breaking free of large cloud providers.
• Chris just got a Zigbee dongle and switched outlet working in under a minute on HA
• Automation and triggers
• Users share their automation routines on the HA subreddit
• mmwave detecting heartbeat
• What is esphome?
• Abstraction / using YAML for business logic
• Deciding when to go custom
• Keith got started doing a PR for an IR remote
• Nixie clocks
• Boldport / Saar
• Getting hooked on SMT builds
• Keith made an STM32 based Tube Clock that Chris was very impressed by at a Chicago meetup
• Keith reworked the sensing for his HVAC by fusing multiple custom sensor boards
• Presence sensor - mmwave + IR sensor
• Geodesic dome
• Tiny fresnel lenses on low cost PIR sensors
• Fixing thermostat in apt
• Creating a network of temp sensors and weighing
• SRE = site reliability engineer
• Nabu Casa cloud service
• The year of the voice
• Home assistant YouTube
• Hardware: Blue, yellow, green
• How often are people reprogramming their devices
• ESPhome discord
• ESPhome.io
• See devices that can be reprogrammed to work with ESPhome
• Reddits
  • ESPhome
  • Homeassistant

• Orthodox Keyzermas
• Twelfth Day of Keyzermas
• Jeff has been taking care of his ailing cat for the past years and learned a lot about administering medicine
• RF
• 8753 / Copper mountain
• Shariar sometimes features Copper Mountain VNAs on the Signal Path
• Step attenuator
• NanoVNA
• Pallav Aggarwal articles
• Murata modules
• Chip down cellular
• Seattle visit
• The big dark
• Input shaping
• Printing with .25mm
• Tek TM500
• Scope on a monitor arm
• Test equipment intervention
• Jay Leno turbine car episode
• Selling on eBay, including stuff made during the process of making parts for Jeff's equipment
• Tek groups.io
• Fluke in Seattle / now Everett
• Vintage Tek Museum
• Being set up to ship things
• Shipping CRTs
• CRTs are in vogue again (?!)
• Low latency
• Retropie
• Oscilloscope music paying premium for RCA / Heathkit
• Jeff was off to Hardware happy hour (3H) Seattle
• Led Zeppelin had many references to Lord Of The Rings. Past guest and Chris's former roommate Steve Kreuzer was a huge LZ fan.

• Benjamin is the developer advocate at The Zephyr Project, which is both a Real Time Operating System and an ecosystem (or almost like a "distro", rather than an OS)
• Benjamin does videos on the Zephyr YouTube and maintains an awesome blog / newsletter
• The ecosystem is deep: Chris recently learned there is a state machine framework
• Multiple people involved in dev like an OS
• The Platinmum Members includes chip companies like NXP, Nordic, ADI
• There are 600+ boards supported in the ecosystem (and more if you do custom)
• Devicetree is a tough concept, but a powerful one that was borrowed from Linux
• Who is the audience for Zephyr?
• Chromebook embedded controller
• What's the smallest processor that Zephyr can run on? M0s can run it no problem
• Chris thinks one of the benefits is the ability to bolt new stuff on to a project
• Simulation through Wokwi (Past Guest Uri) or Renode (Past Guest Michael)
• Using different levels of abstraction
• zephyr i2c init
• Benefits of abstraction
  • Swapping out chips (bubblegum tapshoes)
  • Tying stuff together (bolting stuff on)
  • Infrastructure with CI/CD
• Zephyr doesn't have an official IDE but VScode "just works"
• Helper tools from Nordic
• Open Source
• Hobby projects
• Dev survey
• Custom Keyboards (ZMK)
• RP2040 support
• Arduino recenlty joined the project
• Layers of abstraction
  • Architecture (ie. arm, nios2, x86)
  • SOC (available peripherals surrounding the core)
  • Board (PCB definition which might have:)
    • SOC
    • Memory
    • Peripherals / Sensors
• Check the tree and PRs for sensors that might be in-flight
• Compared to Arduino IDE
• Choosing ecosystems
• Weekly newsletter
• Things you didn't know you needed: NMEA subsystem
• In Jay Carlson's 2nd appearance on the show, he said "I'm reading more code than I'm writing"
• Benjamin's profile photo is of his artificial nose he created a few years ago
• Making a machine model for bread (pandemic)
• It uses TFLite
• What is the project doing? (in parallel)
  • Acquire data
  • Machine learning inference
  • Display update
  • Network interface
• Benjamin reimplemented the Nose in Zephyr using ZBus (Chris recorded a video with the author of this subsystem)
• Like an MQTT broker on device
• Some of the concerns I (Chris) had when I was starting was not understanding RTOS concepts (threads, queues, etc). Brian Amos was on the show talking about his book, which is a great way to get started with these ideas.
• Threading / work queues
• The importance of a project when starting out
• Starter hardware
  • Hero devkits (Chris likes the nRF9160-DK as a starter board or the nRF5340-DK)
  • M5stack boards
  • iMX8
• Jumping down to Zephyr from Linux
• MPU + MCU
• Tight integration
• Zephyr can run POSIX code
• What about the the RT in RTOS? Does this operate realtime often? (timing critical)
• BOM cost and software cost
• Security and dependencies
• Join the Zephyr discord to talk to other people using Zephyr
• TechTalks / YouTube
• Interested in going to a conference in Seattle in 2024 for Zephyr? The ZDS / EOSS CFP is open now!

• Jeff sounds so calm one his videos because he records after the kids are in bed
• He started working with dad at the radio station when there was a transition in radio to digital / online. Jeff had an early job as a technology explainer while making manuals at the station.
• Jeff still makes videos with his Dad on the Geerling engineering channel 
• Ham radio vs broadcast
• 1 Million Watts on the Supertower
• Calling the FCC
• CamOX facility
• Keeping people interested during videos
• Mars 400
• RPi clusters
• It's a good exercise because it helps those building it understanding the limitation of spreading across computers
• Drupal website on cluster
• "The constraint gives me the story"
• A good starter project? Maybe the project pi cluster
• /r/homelab
• NAS, monitoring, VPN, pidramble
• Home Assistant
• ESPhome
• yaml files: better than xml, JSON is better
• Devices should only be added to the house if they are: Local, additive, private
• X10
• Smart stuff in the house
• Interested in the embedded side
• LLM
• Jeff became Chris's de facto Pi5 analyst
• RP1 episode
• PCIexpress
• Jeff discusses RISC V

• Andreas was on the show back in 2015 (ep 254) talking about the Parallela, a crowdfunded parallel calcuation board by his then-company Adapteva
• What is enabling more open source to happen?
  • Unit economics really impact silicon designs
  • Open source effects have been having a positive effect on the industry. Andreas maintains a meta repo of 400 tools.
• Fewer fabs than 2008, mask sets still expensive
• Semiconductor singularity
• Andreas is deep into the world of "chiplets"
• This is the basis of his new company ZeroASIC
• Before he started that he was a program manager at a little outfit called DARPA
• Andreas focused on lowering costs, with the idea that 3 people should be able to design a chip
• He worked under Bill Chappell, the director of the Microsystems Technology Office (MTO)
• OpenROAD
• POSH
• CHIPS
• TinyTapeout
• Andrew Kang UCSD
• Chiplets
• We had Ming Zhang on to tlk about ZGlue, but that was a slightly different architecture
• What is a chiplet?
• AXI on chip
• SERDES
• Types of interconnect
• Organic
• Types of output
• SIP, Chip, SOM
• ZeroASIC is Andreas' latest company
• They started by releasing a Silicon compiler project
• New thing is take system customers and build them an ASIC
• Optimizing speed and cost
• Mostly targeting aerospace and defense
• Try it out yourself on the ZeroASIC emulation page
• Their main processor is a Quadcore RISC V
• There are no off the shelf chiplets
• eFabric Active Interposer
• Defining a standard
• arm made a standard called amba
• AIB from Intel was opensourced
• Getting external contributors (hardware vs software)
• LatchUp - Fossi
• Personal passion drives people to contribute
• You're really buying a datasheet from a big company
• Loading the design to AWS
• Check out the ZeroASIC openings
• Read about how ZeroASIC is democratizing chip making

Welcome back James Adams and Liam Fraser

• The RP1 is the new custom silicon on the Raspberry Pi 5 that is the helper chip to the Broadcom part onboard
• The HW team was last on the show in 2021 talking about the RP2040
• They have been working on the RP1 since 2015
• It's a small team, especially compared to other companies doing custom silicon.
• RP2040 update
• Scripting to reconfigure the silicon clocks/blocks
• Are they making other chips?
• Divvy-ing up duties for silicon
• Broadcom is making the processor and took input for this latest
• Dialog/Renesas do the power chip on the RPi5
• PIO
• Chris gave an example of a board (the Ostentus) where the PIO is just listening for i2c messages and passing them up the stack.
• Design goal was to do cycle by cycle processing
• Someone on twitter having PIO talking to fiber transceivers
• Sourcing and RP2040 availability
• They get 20000 chips per wafer
• Buying wafers a few at a time through IMEC, sometimes through TSMC directly
• There are often small amounts of availability of "wafer starts"
• TSMC40
• IP block updates: USB 3 / Ethernet
• Can do diffs on the verilog
• Receiving high paid IP
• Liam is the sysadmin / servers are on site
• Buying from Synopsis
• Stitching together IP
• They list what version of the IP they're using in the various sections of the datasheet.
• Prototyping on FPGAs
• Controller and Phy interface are exposed
• ProFPGA system with daughtercards
• Can't run at full clock speed on FPGA
• Digital vs analog simulation
• Could someone (competitors) copy things?
• As open as possible, being open where it provides value
• Cost savings on the RP2040
• Traditionally the "Southbridge" is the IO hub for computing, the Northbridge was the cache/memory (later subsumed into large CPUs)
• 2712 on RPi is 16 nm
• This model of creating different generations of silicon but putting them all together is similar to chiplets but...on a PCB
• There is a (hidden-ish) PIO in the RP1.
• There will be more processing delays in RPI5 to deal with, but they won't be noticable because Linux is already pretty not-real-time
• Hoovering up more functions in one chip
• Layout of connectors changed again
• Pins are created to be well laid out on the PCB
• RISC V foundation
• The stack / ecosystem isnt as mature
• James' signature is under the USB3 connector
• RPi5 is "the most raspberry pi raspberry pi" yet

• Chris is out of stock on Tindie and will no longer be a seller (though he was barely one to start with). Props to all the sellers out there!
• Media mail is a low cost post option in the US
• Colin Mitchell allowed people to pay with stamps instead of money orders back in the day
• There is always a struggle for hardware engineers to price a product at the value in the marketplace and not just the cost of parts
• Teardown of DHO800
• Heatsink testing (live during the show)
• CFD
• Controlled depth routing
• We discussed Joe Grand's thin boombox last time, Dave watched a talk where he explained more of the process
• Scotty from Strange Parts did an awesome tour of the JLC PCB Flex factory
• Skewed expectations
• Dave was wondering why during the production assembly of scope that they populated caps but not silicon
• Intel is investing in ARM, RISC V (say what now?)
• eBay U1273A meter
• Old stock
• 30 year old tek chips

• Scott was on Episode 624 talking to Dave about the business of consulting, but they discussed Scott coming back on to get more into the technical side of things.
• Chris listened to the episode and wondered if Scott would get more pulled into management of the day-to-day
• There's a new program in Victoria (Australia) to enforce deposit/rebates on bottles and cans. This opened up an opportunity for an electronics project.
• Bin management is another common IoT project
• Industrial - Site Hive is a long-time customer in the construction space
• Consumer goods
• Scott said he's likely to reach for a Raspberry Pi CM4 for quick prototyping/POC
• Wht about the high density Hirose connectors?
• Does Xentronics "go down the stack" by using tools like Buildroot / Yocto?
• Cameras make products much more difficult. Raspberry Pi cameras have a CSI interface but aren't "standard" per se.
• When starting projects, Xentronics is likely to pull out ESP32 for WiFi, Nordic for Bluetooth, STM32 for generic processing
• Bare metal vs RTOS? Normally they start in the RTOS space to add things later
• Pre-made / prior art
• Colin Karpfinger of Punch Through, a firm that largely focuses on Bluetooth
• EMC resources/courses
  • PCEA educational EMC
  • Todd Hubing
  • Keith Armstrong
  • Ken Wyatt
  • Wurth seminar - Scott never got the recording, but will try again and we'll update here/reddit if he gets it!

https://www.youtube.com/@UCtiK8QrcCrsjDXpKzB1PO1A https://www.ianjohnston.com/

Ask Toby a question here: https://www.eevblog.com/forum/amphour/im-linesman-and-electrical-fitter-in-powerline-distribution-in-australia-ama/

Links:

TransGrid’s substation design standard https://www.transgrid.com.au/media/zgogqoqg/1-1-substation-primary-design-standard-rev-2.pdf https://www.energy.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/2022-08/2019_10_NSW_ServiceAndInstallationRulesOfNSW_underlined.pdf

• Chris and Werner met when Werner gave a talk at HDDG in 2017
• The talk focused on Xmega parts, which have a 2 Msps ADC
• Qoitech is a Sony spinoff, where Werner was working on testing batteries on the cellphones.He had previously also worked on automation during linux mainline work.
• Serial port control is an important thing when doing automated testing
• CDB assist
• PSOC5-LP has a CPLD in it
• The Otii Arc was the first product from Qoitech, it's a 2 quandrant power supply. They started in 2015/2016.
• Chris asked if Werner had previously had used the Keithley 2306
• Field testing is an imporant area for the Otii product line. "Measuremenets on the go" are easier with the extruded case form factor.
• No computer will give you USB PD output power of more than 15W. Test equipment would benefit from a full 200W
• Analyzer (Twinkie?)
• A hub might be possible
• USB Extended Power Range (EPR) will allow 240W
• Are you  sure you should plug that into your computer? Reminder about the OMG cable discussed on the show with MG
• New EPR at 48V has specific shape for arcing
• When designing a power supply for tattoo machine, it could only weigh half the weight of the cable (64g)
• Software defined buck boost was discussed on CNLohr episode
• Digital control is easier to get stable than analog because of programmable delays in the pipeline. You need to measure how long it takes to get the output to "show up"
• Audio project real time jam sessions
• The new product from Qoitech (that Chris got to see at Embedded World in 2023) is the Otii Ace
• PJRC convinced Werner to check out the NXP RT106x family (instead of RT105x)
• Otii is working on battery stuff
• Arc has been out since 2017, but was limited output voltages 500 mv - 5V
• Ace came out recently and goes up to 25V at 5A
• 3 isolation domains in Ace - chassis, banana jacks, expansion ports
• Want resistor on low side for coloumb counter
• Can stack Aces up to 200V
• Dealing with RFI when different domains
• Increased sample rate
• 8 simultaneous sampled ADCs
• Turns readings into audio signals for RT1060, which allows data to stream easier
• There is one reference voltage driving everything in the design, they send frequency spike across gaps to all isolated sections using RF isolators
• Hard time getting the RT1060 parts during shortage
• Battery stuff
• Stepping through the battery internal resistance
• Edging into the world of SMUs
• Building a curve
• Replaying battery data
• Battery emulation
• Continuous integration testing
• Syncing to firmware
• Battery aging
• Devices running on coin cells
• Cycling and automated testing and see it degrade over time
• Thinking of batteries as impedance devices
• Batteries having a passivation layer
• "Low power" means different things to different people
• Teardown of battery emulator
• Low power is less than 200W
• Qoitech equipment has been used in testing and production, including "in-the-loop" testing
• "Generational degrade" when using previous versions of the product to validate new versions of the product. Instead they have a NIST traceable DMM in the loop
• Chris mentions ever calibration shop has a Fluke calibrator. Apparently the HP 8753 wasn't available in EU because of RoHS.
• To learn more about Werner and the Qoitech team, check out the Otii Ace page

• Chris first learned of Aedan from his 2022 Hackaday talk about building an AR system
• AR is "Augmented Reality", but that term is different depending on the company / headset (think "magic leap" vs "google glass")
• Got into AR because of robotics, he had be doing software around SLAM and CV
• Interacting with objects in 3D space
• The first board he was working with was the Jetson TK1
• Magic Leap's "Lightpack" had a Tegra in it
• Apple's new Vision Pro is more like VR with passthrough (and creepy eyes!)
• Being able to wear an AR unit all day
• Resolution matters
• What is it worth spending power on in a headset?
• The previous rev used the AllWinner D1 RISCV and can support one camera
• Which way should you point a camera on a pair of glasses?
• MIPI DSI outputs and DSP processing
• Lots of SIPs available for high density designs
• Octavo makes SIPs out of other companies' silicon.
• Jason and Robert from BeagleBoard talked about Octavo when they were on the show
• ECX337 from Sony needs 10V
• Torex power modules helped save space too by being stacked on top of the inductor
• Sony uses LVDS (FPDlink) and not MIPI
• Offloaded processing to a phone or computer
• Power
• Wi-Fi vs bluetooth
• New goal is to minimize power during processing, now it'll be efficiency around WiFi and Display
• With OLEDs you can selectively turn on pixels
• Goal for the battery is 8 hours for "all day"
• What is Aedan's "requirements space" and what's driving it?
• Cost has become a concern for new boards
• Using an assembly house to have one known-good assembly board
• What's on the new board?
  • The new display has MIPI DSI
    • The display doesn't support 2 lane DSI out of the box
    • Displays are sometimes configurable in terms of how many lanes with registers
    • What do the lanes refer to? Each pair ("Data lane") is a differential pair
    • Most displays will do 4 lanes (8 conductors) at 1Gbps
    • "Giganibbles per second"
    • Silicon backplane with OLED on top
    • ViewTrix
  • The processor is the NXP iMX RT500
    • "This is design is made for Garmin"
    • Aedan is coding it in Zephyr
    • Drivers are in MCUexpresso
    • DCnano display driver in Zephyr
    • no GPU driver in Zephyr
    • 2D GPU in the chip
  • WiFi module is the same as the past rev, the Si Labs WFM200S
    • Sending compressed data over the WiFi link
  • Mechanical
    • Tweaking displays and 3D printed mounts
    • Prism
    • Flex cables
    • XReal / NReal
    • Using your brain as the combiner
• Zach from Voidstar
• Aedan just went to the Augmented World Expo in May. "No one was wearing an AR display around the conference"
• Vision for the future
• Follow Aedan online
  • GitHub
  • Twitter

• CNLohr has been working on projects and a library for the ch32v003, the $0.10 RISC V part
• Dave has made a video about that part, using the official toolchain from MounRiver
• How far will you take the chip?
• Moving from knowing the arm instruction set to the RISC V instruction set
• The benefits of knowing assembly
• The CH32V003 is a RISC V part in the low end space made by WCH. CN thinks it's about eqiuvalent to an AVR
• You can buy a dev board on Tindie (this is the one Dave and Chris have)
• Compiler tooling is done for you
• AVR GCC
• While discussing Espressif entering the market the way in which they did, CN said, "There's only going to be one of these in all of computing"
• Community reversing esp8266 using a virtual machine that had a leaked toolchain on it.
• Compared to cc2500 / mediatek / realtek
• ESP8266 without an RTOS "nonOS SDK"
• lwip and wifi stack
• Community port of FreeRTOS onto the ESP8266
• CN worked on the "NoSDK 8266"
• It didn't have the WiFi enabled which meant timing wasn't critical and he could overclock it to 380 MHz
• Minecraft on a microscope slide
• Ethernet on an AVR
• Other people in this space
• igor plug
• lwusb is massive (relative to the space on the CH32V003)
• What about the support burden of writing things yourself?
• Chris made a comparision to college
• USB on CH32v003
• CNLohr already had hardware on hand for decoding and debugging the USB stack
• He livestreamed the development!
• Chris said he was not sure he could livestream, but CN said that the audience acts like rubber ducks and pair programming
• ESPUSB
• vusb on avr
• Does communicty work like this have an influence on the market?
• Padouk 3-8 cent micro
• Grainuum library (later figured out it was written by past guest xobs!)
• lufa / tinyusb
• What are the physical requirements to implement USB without a transceiver? Only real thing is you need a pullup on the USB D- line
• You also need to change pins from intput to output in the window of responding
• Can make HID devices, but everything is low speed USB (1.5 Mbps)
• CN built the Nixie tube controller
• On GitHub there are examples on how to use various aspects of the part
• The chip has DMA
• During the chip shortages, CN was browsing lcsc and found a 10:1 transformer and wondered if he could make a flyback with it
• Single wire debug
• Check out the CH332V003fun library on github 
• Getting started
• The next few months CN will be working on getting everything to be really good for the library
• There will also be support for other (larger, more expensive) parts
• Join the Discord! (cnlohr)
• Follow CNLohr on YouTube

• Andrea is a consultant in the HW / FW space, based out of Italy.
• Chris met Andrea when he was transitioning to consulting and he joined the consulting forum.
• Andrea comes from a family of engineerhing, His father is an EE who made PCBs at home but kept it from the kids
• He worked at ST Micro designing drivers for server disk drives
• If you lose power, the arm will crash into the platen. So when power fails, you use the energy in the motor to backpower the arm.
• Didn't like being pigeonholed and he wanted to get into apps engineering
• Moved to Maxim, which he knew about because of their sample program
• Working in automotive space: harsh environment and dealing with things like:
  • Load dump
  • Cold crank
  • Low power during shutdown
• Dealing with customers on last minute basis
• Went abroad to the UK and worked for ARM/PA Consulting
• Chris asked about the engineering culture in Italy/UK
• Lot of focus on theory
• "With the internet you can become an expert very quickly"
• AL2Tech is Andrea, his brother Allessandro and a lab assistant
• Had been back at Maxim focused on low power, connected devices
• What's it like working with a sibling?
• Finding first client as a consultant:
  • Networking with people on linkedin
  • Looking at job openings and offering part time work
  • Did it while building up the company
  • Showing side projects (air quality sensor + BLE) since he couldn't talk about his work at chip companies
• It worked when a small company took a chance on him
• FAEs were big companies, didn't get access to the smaller company engs
• Building test boards to learn new things (for the Joulescope), like a custom front panel
• Gas monitoring is an area of focus for AL2tech
• The device is battery powered, sitting on the meter.
• Certification is critical: the certifying body is looking at schematic / layout and making sure nothing heats past the point of igniting gas.
• Zone 0, 1, 2
• Conformal coating
• Why not put everything in Resin? Cost
• Volume correctors for gas monitoring
• For billing, they lean on PV=nRT
• Internal product at AL2Tech is the Elektra
• There is a CO sensor that caches data and sends over NFC and BLE
• It detaches from a shirt with battery, but a reed switch disables power when not connected (so it can be washed)
• Using the shirt to attract people and talk about capabilities
• Embedded World helped expand outside of Italy
• Other proejcts
  • Rain Vision
  • Tauanito Sensors
• Find Andrea on LinkedIn 
• Check out al2tech.com to learn more about the company

• Ken heard episode #631 where Chris was talking about a Noisy Rude Bus and he objected. Stringently (it seems Ken has since pulled down the posts, but they were in good fun)
• Chris had been planning to talk about Ken's recent awesome post about CAN hacking and cars being stolen, so he asked Ken to be on the show!
• CAN was invented to reduce weight in car cable harnesses, which were increasing rapidly with more electrical features being included.
• CAN vs LIN
• CAN was expensive, but LIN is cheap because it's bit banging the protocol from a microcontroller
• There are bridges to go between CAN and LIN buses.
• Modern cars have 20-100 ECUs (controllers), but it depends on the features the car has. But that's not just microcontrollers, Ken estimates that could be as high as 700.
• Chris and Ken both had dealth with Philips / Freescale / NXP / Motorola as silicon vendors in the automotive space
• How does a tiny microcontroller get data onto the bus?
• Prioritized traffic
• CAN indentifier field has priority baked in
• Bus works like a giant AND gate where the lowest address wins
• 11 bits
• How to unwind CAN traffic
• Packing signals into CAN frame
• Tools to reverse engineer
• Protocol decoder for sigrok
• CAN HG
• 250kb is slow
• CAN bus bandwidth
• There is Ethernet in cars now, especially with more and more cameras
• Bandwidth vs latency
• Addressing through a gateway
• Atomic broadcasts means you know that each device has processed it
• Protocol hacking
• Trucks aren't OEM based so more vertically integrated
• SAE J1939 standard in trucks
• If say Toyota develops the CAN messages, DBC files decode everything.
• But manufacturers don't publish them, so some car messages are reverse engineered
• Accessories bus
• Who has access to DBCs?
• Diagnostic systems
• OBD2
• CARB
• CAN is physical ISO 11898
• CAN XL has IP packets, so you can use wireshark
• Ken has written about wireshark
• CAN 2.0, CAN FD
• Devices on a bus are normally all bare metal or RTOS because of the timing requirements
• OSEK standard
• Embedded system abstraction
• Dealing with the magnitude of decisions making in the automotive industry
• Chris asked about whether self-driving will happen in 5 or 20 years? (ie. does he agree with Chris or Dave). It was the latter, sadly.
• Autonomic Cars podcast with Dr Phil Coopman

Check out his new book, Up and to the Right. How Microchip was built into one of the biggest and most pofitable chip companies in the world.

In this episode we discussed:

• The early microcontrollers, ROM, EPROM, EEPROM, FLASH
• Semiconductor Fab's and locations
• How the US Government CHIPS act is a golden handcuffs trap
• US/China rhetoric
• What really happened durign the covid supply chain crisis
• How 90% of medical devices use Microchip parts
• Lead times
• Respect for the chip manufacturers and supply chains
• Just-In-Time becomes Just-In-Case
• How the Toyota production system works and how it had to change
• The impacts of a potential war in Taiwan
• How does it make sense to make thousands of part variants?
• The secret to making part varients
• Why Microchip chose MIPS vs ARM
• Atmel didn't make any money!
• Pricing discipline
• How buying Atmel almost didn't happen, and how Dialog Semiconductor goofed it
• Draconian NDA terms
• Atmel was bloated
• RISC-V plans
• Customer Driven Obsolescence
• Foundry vs In-House limitations
• Open Source FPGA tools?
• Third party tool support
• Why not offer free optimised compilers?
• It's all about black swan events, down cycles, pointy haired bosses, and how All your Cost Bases Beyong To Me
• Hobbyist vs professionals
• How Microchip is the largest aerospace chip maker in the world. Nothing leaves earth without a Microchip part in it.
• Radiation hardended parts
• Market value profitability
• Will Microchip ever get acquired
• Strained US vs China relations

• Chris and Ari went to high school together and Chris was excited to have Ari on the show to talk about how renewables are implemented in the US
• Ari recenly started his DOE job
• He was interested in joining the organization after a large funding effort in the US Senate and House (signed into law)
  • The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA)
  • The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL), also known as the Infrastructure and Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA)
• There is now $100B going towards electrification and upgrading of the US infrastructure and homes in the US.
• The funding is driving supply side incentives to move to renewables, instead of Cap and Trade to disincentivize carbon rich activities.
• Chris asked Ari about the green credits market and whether people should pay attention (John Oliver carbon offsets piece discussed in the past)
• What are the tradeoffs of targeting upgrading homes for efficiency vs solar installs on a roof?
• Solar in the US
• Ari working in a narrow subset at DOE
• Chris has read exactly one book about The Grid, talked about many times on the show before.
• Running capacity building
• Ari is part of the Office of State and Community Programs, which administers a portion of the overall 100B
• There is a large amount of net new electric load, in the form of EVs, appliances, heat pumps, etc. This could roughly double electricity usage for providers and transporters of energy.
• Tennesee has a large manufacturing base and are growing into batteries. This is map of battery activity in the US.
• Ari has 84kW battery in his car, these kind of capacities will only grow over time.
• Is new load a good thing or a bad thing?
• Power providers are excited about it!
• Investor owned utilties are natural monopolies, which is why there is something called a Public Utility Commission (PUC) to regulate them.
• Ari and Chris made up an example about a fake US state (Electifica) with a fake provider company (Utopia), so that we weren't talking about any specific examples.
• Utopia trades on the stock market and there are known returns, so there are expectations about how things will work.
• Utlities are incentivized to maximize costs because they make percentage returns on the costs passed to customers. PUCs want the opposite.
• Microgrid
• DER - Distributed Eletric Resources
• Energy efficiency and demand response programs are where they notify customers of high load and ask the customer to turn things down. Sometimes there is "Smart Grid" style programs where the utility can take action centrally (turning down thermostats, etc)
• There was a Demand Reponse Brooklyn Queens program that worked
• Building a substation is very expensive, but gives an additional control node
• What is the effect of solar on the grid?
• Microgrids can enable additional cross-grid control, but it gets tricky when figuring out billing for the crossing between subgrids (because utilities have very different billing paradigms)
• Peaker plants need to spin up very quickly and are very dirty.
• Utilities encouraging people to buy battieres
• The Duck Curve
• A net zero passive house could extend usage off a battery backup system and highly reduce load on the grid.
• Building codes can have a large impact on future energy usage by determining how future homes load down the grid.
• Codes in Florida also help things like disaster response.
• There is a large chunk of that $100B going "Transmission sighting", because additional control nodes on the grid will require additional land (often in expensive areas)
• Ari previously worked on renewables for the District of Columbia.
• With rooftop and solar on the edge of the city, they could cover about 10% of city usage.
• Power companies moving from owning and operating everything is changing paradigms generally.
• How can you learn more?
  • Ari suggests reading legislation
    • BIL
    • IRA
  • Check out the Energy.gov site for general info
  • Read more about Ari's programs at the DOE SCEP

• Dave has been on the show a couple of times in the past
  • 305
  • 409
  • 601
• Chris was recently on Embedded.fm talking about Golioth and firmware
• PUZZLER: Chris lays out a problem with home power
  • Email theamphour@gmail.com with the subject "PUZZLER"
• Chip shortage is...over? (better?)
• Inspring kids (including students) around electronics
• Amazon Sidewalk is now available, it operates through Amazon devices if you're using AWS IOT.

• Just prior to recording, Chris saw that Dave had been talking about a different "AI autorouter"
• Configuration on Quilter is currently pretty simple (not a lot
• Sergiy worked at SpaceX in 2014 doing a bunch of boards for testing
• "PCBs were the tail end of the design, so it became the critical path"
• Check out some of the public designs on the Quliter Blog
• Quilter has remade the schematic of the OpenMV camera. This reworked board is indicative of the kinds of boards they can handle.
• Generally sub-300 MHz, Sub 2A
• Quilter has a full time EE on staff who helps try out different designs and give feedback.
• They can parellelize designs by sending them off to a cluster for processing.
• Chris noted that it felt similar to Place and Route on an FPGA.
• Quilter doesn't currently enforce "octolinear traces", so the traces aren't straight lines.
• It makes it possible to detect generative designs, like on the "QPlayer" example
• The toold helps by defining manufacturing constraints for you, specifically around available board houses.
• Cost of compute
• How do you balance the problem of knowledge? Chris and Dave discussed this for newer engineers in episode 625
• "What is the job of a PCB?" (perfectly replicate a schematic)
• Quilter is doing additional checks, including solving for Maxwell's equations and Thermodynamics
• There are decisions to make within the routing algorithm, ie. Should they enforce "star ground"?
• When starting out, there was skepticism around code compilers! But over time people came to trust them more and more.
• How can you try out Quilter? Sign up for waitlist! The best candidat designs will be:
  • Sub 2000 pins
  • sub 100 parts
  • sub 100Mhz
  • sub 2A
  • Open source designs
• All the boards on the site have no human input
• When trying out the service, many customers don't trust the first board (but later they start to)
• Spits boards back out as the same file format, they currently support KiCad, Altium, Eagle
• NASA story designing S band antenna
• When starting with new boards, the tool will import outlines by parsing layers in KiCad / Altium / Eagle.
• Reconsidering different elemetns of a design (constraints)
• Relaxing constraints (physics)
• Software models
• Why don't some of these tools exist in layout software? Specifically simulation and physics engines.
• Many do! (Ansys, TDK, etc). Often the cost isn't justified for simpler boards, so people go without.
• Feeding back real world squishiness into the model
• Costs - Not yet set, but there will be different tiers for hobbyists and open source designs. Sergiy mentioned $50/month for non-enterprise, but it seems like it's much too early to tell.
• Check out more on the site at quilter.ai

• He worked at Willow Run early in his career (facility now closed)
• Henry Ford Community College
• Larry Sears
• Having joy in the courses
• The Knack
• John Davis joined on a previous episode to talk about Industrial machines
• What is a PLC?
• Relay ladder logic
• Industrial Computer vs Controller
• Scan loop on a PLC
• XIC / XIO
• A Distributed Control System (DCS) networks many controllers together
• Don taught a blueprint reading class
• Chris asked about why connectors are drawn the way they are
• Later in his career, Don moved from the industrial space to design in cars
• Wiring harness
• Body controller module
• CAFE laws - California Air Fuel Economy
• 68hc11
• Wetting current for switches
• CAN
• Cigarette lighters in cars
• Don was working on the (Jeep) Grand Cherokee
• Decoding CAN with a scope
• Packard electric connectors
• Cars have a "shower curtain" for water in the door
• Don got his PhD and switched to education
• He taugh courses like
  • Electric Circuits 1 / 2
  • Intro to robotics
  • Automated system and diagnosis
  • Electronics Industrial Maintenance
• Instructors putting bugs into the system to test students
• PLCs still reign supreme
• Arduino recently released the Opta, which is targeted at the industrial market
• Don writes for Control.com
• OpenPLC is software that can run on a variety of accessible platforms (like ESP32/Arduino/etc)
• Industrial I/O
• OpenPLC based on IEC spec (61131-3)
• Different programming styles of programming
• Blackhat (movie) with Chris Hemsworth
• Stuxnet worm
• He wrote and article about using OpenPLC with Arduino
• Dr Don has a new book that was just released! The M5 stack book
• Continuing Education Courses
• IEEE certificate
• Dr Don will be speaking at the Embedded Online conference coming up in April

• Amitabh moved from Physics into Engineering. He did an internship at Brandeis for astophysics and radio astronomy and realized astrophysics mostly coding these days.
• Kit for teaching teachers in India
• There was a limited Electronics scene in India. Amitabh grew up in Bangalore (Bengaluru)
• Manufacturing in India has been growing, including in the silicon space. Chris used to work at a place that had a CM in Bangalore.
• Gaming startup making tag games using LoRa
• XBee
• Logistics company that tracked 2 wheelers. Their breakout product was a laser scanner for packages.
• Amitabh went to ITP at NYU, which is a technology and art crossover program. Past guest of the show Matt Richardson also went there.
• Creative aspects vs technical aspects.
• Amitabh enjoyed consulting for other artist, much like past guests Mike Harrison and Todd Bailey discussed.
• Programmable Air is a kit that allows people to more easily build soft robots and use pumps.
• Chris and Amitabh met at Teardown 2019. That was also the event where Chris recorded with Joshua and Zach, before recording again this year.
• A "jammer gripper" is a soft robot that allows you to pick up arbitrarily shaped objects using friction.
• "Backpack inflatable car" from Otherlab
• Open Source Project
• Programmable Air was crowdfunded on Crowd Supply. As such, it's still available on Mouser.
• The valves in the kit were meant for keurig machines. Spec sheets are super basic for mechanical components.
• Chris saw Amitabh at Supercon 22 wearing a backpack refrigerator. It's called "Refrigediro"
• Amitabh gave a talk about the project at Hackaday Supercon 2022
• The source of the name is "Harry potter and the methods of rational thinking"
• Refrigeration is an old industry
• PV=nRT
• Kipp Bradford and Adam Savage video on building tiny refrigeration.
• Other uses for small scale refrigeration is vaccine storage, cold chain storage.
• Ammonia refrigeration allows you to keep things cold with a fire.
• Gradient window cooler is a heat pump with a cool form factor. Not shipping yet though?
• Modding an icemaker
• Follow Amitabh on Instagram or YouTube for his latest experiments and builds. Follow him most places as "Tinkrmind"

• Matt was previously on Episode 467 from 2019 Supercon, before he started working on the open source toolchains and the education around them.
• A bunch of news in the open source silicon space
  • Latest shuttle was MPW8, MPW9 coming up soon
  • 2 new open PDKs
• Open source tools growing, much of it comes from Google "Willy Wonka-ing" process and sponsoring the shuttle
• This was driven by past guest Tim Ansell (on 501)
• Tim Edwards of efabless
• Claire Wolf was on the show in the past
• Dan Burke talked with Matt at Supercon 2023 about the term "Tapeout"
• Matt runs the  ZeroToAsicCourse youtube channel, which includes a podcast.
• Global Foundries / IHP open source
• What is driving the growth?
  1. Open source tools
  2. Google MPW
  3. Open source PDK
  4. RISC V
• Ming Zhang on The Amp Hour talking about chiplets with ZGlue (now defunct).
• If you don't get into the lottery, you can pay efabless $10K for 300 chips
• Packaging is also tough
• Volume problems - What happens between 300 chips and 10K chips?
• Why should people get started with trying out the open source tools?
• Why are people signing up for the couse?
  • 30-50% want to understand silicon
  • 20% are academic -- many Universities are switching to the open source toolchain
  • 20-30% are commercial users who might want to use the info for
• Reasons for going custom silicon as a business?
  • Security by obscurity
  • Space
  • Power
  • Sourcing (?)
• MPW gives you about 10 sq mm
• Matt put more designs onto his MPW slot, bundling even more designs (which has continued on)
• OpenRAM
• You could fit 25K of SRAM on 10 sq mm
• #OpenSourceASICHighlight
• Mohamed Kassem of eFabless was on the show in the past. eFabless highlights designs on their site.
• Check out the 2022 highlight video from Matt!
• Open Tapeout
• FOSSI foundation runs the Latchup Conference
• OSDA
• India driving growth of chip design, many large scale companies also have verification teams in india
• Security and "inspectability" from cloud companies
• Root of trust chips - Laura from Oxide talked about this when she was on the show.
• TSMC has an educational program for students in Taiwan
• TinyTapeout
• Extension of the course, joining designs together with a tristate bus
• "Vosotros" is the "y'all" of the Spanish language
• HDL is mostly controlled by the tools
• OpenLane by eFabless was based on OpenRoad
• TinyTapeout is meant for beginners
• Uri from Wokwi (on show 599) worked with Matt on TinyTapeout
• He added gates to Wokwi, which then can be connected together. The program pushes the gates out, which then can be synthesized.
• You're closer to the hardware with Wokwi than you will be with Verilog.
• 500-600 standard cells in tiny tapeout
• The Shuttle lottery is getting harder to win
• There are more TinyTapeout slots
• It costs $25 for design only, $100 for chips
• When you get the chip back on a PCB, you select your design (or others!) with a DIP switch
• Check out what was on the TinyTapeout 2nd run
• Olof Kindgren won the Serv RISC V prize, which is a small bit serial processor. Past guest Greg Davill put that design onto TinyTapeout.
• There is a Discord for the course
• Siliwiz explains how silicon can work, allows you to use sliders to control how the silicon gate sizes change.
• A wafer will take 6 months start to finish if all goes well.
• MPW1-4 had a hold violation. Sylvain (TNT) who was also on episode 467 did some wizardry to get things working!
• Siliwiz still not open to public
• What does it take to tape out a design? Putting the logic inside of other logic when creating a wafer. Then eFabless takes care of the rest.
• The harness with everything that allows you to access the low level IO is called "caravel"
• Europractice is another IC service

• Alvaro Prieto is a co-host of The Unnamed Reverse Engineering podcast and has co-hosted The Amp Hour before. He currently works at Sofar Ocean.
  • 363 
  • 456.2
  • 440.2
  • 440.3
• Ariel Briner was on episode 260 of the show talking about CartesianCo, a now defunct startup. Ariel now runs an 8 person consulting shop in SF called Electron Labs.
• Chris Osterwood was on episode 425 talking about Capable Robot Components, which he is still working on. They are preparing to release new hardware in 2023.
• State of robotics
• Possible to have consulting with robotics?
• We were recording during CES 2023
• AgTech
• Robotic pizza
• 3H meetup
• Modex Fulfilment(conference)
• IoT
• Electron labs projects are 30% IoT, but more are connected (50%+)
• iPhone globalstar connection is now possible and Iridium is coming soon.
• Alvaro uses Blues Wireless modems to do firmware updates on buoys near the shore. Ray Ozzie (founder and CEO of Blues) was on episode 603.
• Bugs in different locations due to unicode characters (or null characters)
• FreeRTOS vs Zephyr
• STM32U5 has DMA in stopmode, which is a low power option for DMA
• Alvaro has been creating Joulescope front plates
• What kind of mix of hw and software are each person doing?
• USB C cable tester
• ESP32-C3 is a RISC V wifi chip from Espressif. There is also support for Rust on that and some other Espressif chips (Chris Osterwood has been trying it out)
• Hubris OS from Oxide. Oxide engineer Laura Abbott talked about this when she was on the show. Another Oxide engineer Rick Altherr was on the show (before he worked there)
• Board bringup is a hardware activity for fimware engineers.
• Firmware with hardware when the power rails are controlled by the micro
• CM4 / Linux
• Buildroot vs Yocto
• Custom vs dev board
• Chaos camp
• Mark Rober video (car breakins)
• RISC V
• AI
• Midjourney
• ChatGPT
• Is it all just "Stochastic BS"?

• Jeff has been at his place in Seattle since 2018
• Previously when he was in Redmond, he put his antenna up in the trees
• This year Jeff set up antennas at his new place
• New things in Amateur radio, SDRs
• ICOM IC705 portable
• Sunspot cycles impact how far you can communicate
• 5-10 watts in the backyard
• Taking ham radio setup camping
• Crater lake
• Goldeneye antenna coming out of a lake (Aricibo, now busted)
• Cape Disappointment
• Parks on the Air
• "2022...which is this year"
• Long Beach Washington kite festival
• Jeff put an antenna on a kite
• Doers vs talking in amateur radio
• FT8 mode
• QRZ.com
• IC7300 brought people back
• Alan Wolke YouTube channel
• Jeff hasn't been doing much consulting
• Kit business gangbusters because of Ukraine
• Atmel DIP parts are easier to get than other Atmel parts (but still not easy)
• Eurorack companies closing
• Test equipment upgrade
• 8753D
• Agilent took down legacy resources
• Fixing test equipment as a way to learn
• 53310A
• Can't just get a piece of test equipment on a whim
• GPS connected to MDA can get parts per billion (!)
• Plot frequency vs time
• Saluki
• Fusion news
• Hotplate vs oven for reflow
• Making generated art (couldn't pass up the Clark Griswold reference, sorry)

• Listener points out Dave said to slap him in Episode 255 if he ever said he was getting a pick and place. Dave stated as much in episode #610
• Dave posted a bunker tour and clean up video on Odyssey
• 10 cent micro showed up to Chris's lab (discussed in #610)
• The tooling has a windows focus, the toolchain is called MounRiver. There is some OpenOCD tooling specifically for it.
• GitHub repos open a web based VScode window when you hit "." (period). You need to be logged in.
• Discussion on embedded.fm 435 about GitHub codespaces
• Christmas lights
• Arduino is targeting the industrial market with the Opta "microPLC". They will have ladder logic for this device.
• John Davis was on episode 385 talking about the difficulties of working in a machine building environment.
• A new part from Sony/Altair, the ALT1350, looks like it has EVERYTHING in it: Cellular, GPS, WiFi (hotspot finding only), 2.4GHz / 802.15.4, sub Gig. So many radios!
• Lock teardowns
• Artemis
• The Grid (book)

Automated transcript

00:24.37 chrisgammell And I’m Chris Gammell of the slapping industries because I am supposed to be slapping you.

00:30.24 Dave Well oh I know what this is about right? Thank you to the person who put this on who do who did who put it on the silly lie and yeah, thank you very much got the most up votes. Yeah, go ahead. Do it do it. Although I haven’t technically got 1

00:36.26 chrisgammell Ah, five days ago yeah this is this this silly lion.

00:43.43 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay here we go here. We go ladies and gentlemen in the light of last week’s episode I just wanted to say that in episode number two fifty five at timestamp Fifty Six Twenty Dave says that quote.

00:47.77 Dave So you know and.

01:00.31 chrisgammell You ever hear me utter. The the words I’m contemplating getting a pick in place just you know slap me. Thank you and happy holidays. Fantastic! What a great callback? Yeah yeah there we go all right? all It’s okay, yeah.

01:07.57 Dave Ah, ah, ah or cheese and ah oh I think I’ve come to my senses I well was I thinking. Ah oh boy. Yeah, um, so yeah, so trust some nerd to remember.

01:20.52 chrisgammell And yeah, well I mean that’s I have to wonder like were they just now listening were they to listen to it recently or they have like photographic memory. Yeah, right, Very impressive.

01:25.78 Dave Right? Remember Well did they actually pull that out of their memory bank I wouldn’t surprise me if they pulled that out of their memory bank because I can still say oh yeah I can remember that in in you know, an episode ah episode and a copy of.

01:44.83 chrisgammell And yeah, yeah, it probably means that they they they had something in their memory that they they’re like yeah I really would like to see Dave slapped.

01:45.10 Dave Electronicks Australia Magazine back in 1985 there was this article that said blah blah blah blah blah you know like I can probably pull that out of my ass. But.

01:57.77 Dave Right? Slap me right? Yeah possibly Yep yep I don’t know I’d like ah I don’t know what triggered it I don’t know.

02:04.26 chrisgammell Ah.

02:09.15 chrisgammell What the the urge to get a I think it is completely natural I Think here’s here’s the thing the ah the I think the journey often goes like this.

02:10.15 Dave The ah the the lust for a pick and yeah, the urge to get a pick and place machine I don’t right.

02:21.58 chrisgammell Ah I’m so frustrated if only I could just build you know like ah these boards are taking so long to build if I’m sending them out or they’re taking so long to build if I have them in-house. All I just needed is some robot to do this. It would be so easy if a robot would do this and the answer is yeah of course it would if it was perfect but it it just sucks you know like even you know even the ones.

02:26.95 Dave There. All right? and and then you start realizing that it’s oh it’s only five bucks a board to get your board assembled or whatever right insert symbol here like and insert your assembly figure.

02:41.15 chrisgammell Yeah. Sure sure yeah.

02:48.61 Dave There right? Yeah, but let’s just say five bucks to assemble aboard you go like well how do you justify $10000 pick and place machine and all the infinite amount of time and energy required to run it and massage it and maintain it and pull your hair out and learn it and you know and.

02:56.98 chrisgammell Yes.

03:03.51 chrisgammell Yeahp I think it’s it’s really that like the idea of like the drop of the hat you know I always talk about like the 2 a m problem and like if you had a thing at 2 am yeah you know like this would be super super useful, but most people I feel like do not have that and the ones that do you know.

03:06.68 Dave Yeah, right? yep.

03:20.10 Dave Yeah, oh yeah, of course well I think part of my motivation is that it would and part of the inspiration is that I think it might motivate me into doing actual designs and getting them assembled.

03:21.50 chrisgammell It’s probably faster cheaper to just pay for overnight service like from a actual assembly house. So I think it’s.

03:37.50 chrisgammell M.

03:39.21 Dave Right? because I’ve if I’ve got the capability there I go oh here’s an idea for I could sell a couple hundred of these boards you know? and yeah, why not just do this and then just right.

03:41.56 chrisgammell And yeah I I I don’t I don’t agree with that for myself I think that’s like the the buying a buying a treadmill in order to start running I think really I should just go outside and start running. Yeah.

03:54.21 Dave Right? Okay, yeah, yeah, you should just and do it but I’m sort of a bit and unusual Caseian I’ve got a large audience who will you know look if I came up with some little widget that you know I could probably like sell and distribute a couple of hundred of them. That’s that’s that’s no problem I think so you know.

04:00.40 chrisgammell Sure sure I think.

04:09.41 chrisgammell I’m sure you could yeah of course of course. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I’m not saying that I’m saying that you should if you were actually serious about that you should build 2 little widgets first. Yeah yeah.

04:13.85 Dave Yeah I should build the widgets first and then and then figure and well maybe I should do that. Maybe I should build the maybe I should build a couple of widgets in anticipation of getting a pick and place machine right? And then I haven’t ready to go. Yeah.

04:24.64 chrisgammell A exactly right? because and there’s always future ones too right? You’re going to. You’re going to do like variations and upgrades and stuff like that. So yeah.

04:35.48 Dave Yeah, well well well straight off the bat I could get into remanufactory my um, my microcurrent or a variation of it. Maybe I can just do a new variant of that. But I’ve got a couple of ideas I just need the inspiration to spend the time on them to you know to actually get it done. So.

04:40.36 chrisgammell Chair there here. Yeah, yep, totally right? yeah.

04:52.61 Dave Yeah, and and I’ve got the extra room now to do it So that that’s another thing right? Well actually it pretty much I think it it was that no it was if you see my video. It’s um, over it’s on my Odyssey channel.

04:56.74 chrisgammell Right? right? Maybe oh actually it’s full of stuff already.

05:11.23 chrisgammell No, okay, that’s I haven’t in that yet. Yeah.

05:12.60 Dave It’s an exclusive over there I think I don’t think I put it on my main thing. But anyway we have to link it in. It’s where yeah I actually cleaned up my bunker and I was so astonished at the amount of bench space I had and I went war I could put a desktop pick and place machine here if I wanted to you know and.

05:20.62 chrisgammell Um, yeah.

05:27.14 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, yeah.

05:31.90 Dave And and then I actually started So that’s what like I and then I just grabbed my camera and I just shot a little blurb down there and that’s what that’s where the inspiration came from I think and and.

05:38.74 chrisgammell That’s what started the whole thing. Why and so and actually there was an update on that right? So we had we had talked about it on the show and then you would also kind of kept going with it and then I think you had kind of figured out that like you don’t you don’t want to go with that machine that you had talked about on the show.

05:44.29 Dave Yes, well.

05:52.34 Dave No the kit. No, even though. Um, thank you the light place. Sorry I forget his name but um, yeah, he’s still making the light place and he did. He said if I if I wanted to actually do because the kit I’ve got is like 7 years old and so it’s not you know.

06:06.40 chrisgammell Note this wasn’t the kit. This was ah you had talked about the the YYZ or something like that if you the need why I okay yeah.

06:11.70 Dave Ah, all the ah why why one yeah the yeah yeah, no I no look there. There’s been discussion on the forum I’m involved in this forum 3 where some people are you know there’s like 3 or 4 people on the ev blog forum we’ve got one you know and like. There’s there’s 1 person saying look. It’s okay, it’s doing the job. You know I solved these problems but most people seem to think oh no, the feeders are really dicky and you know and then the last thing you want is feeders that a dicky right? That’s that’s the whole thing with pick and place machines is reliable feeders right.

06:45.58 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, totally yeah.

06:47.27 Dave That’s that’s that’s that’s like the biggest grief with a pick and place machine. It’s not that you got to spend the time to programmer you know, look that’s you know, easy easy peasy right? Yeah, no, but that’s but that’s you got to do that with any you got to do that with any machine right? But the differences between machines are in how reliable is the pick and place.

06:53.18 chrisgammell But that’s that’s something. But yeah, it’s not as much right? Yeah yeah.

07:06.46 Dave Stuff how reliable is the vacuum system the feeders, the pulloon the tape back and you know doing all the rest of it right? Can you just set it up and go and come back and you know you’re a thousand parts are done orchi or do you have to sit there and massage the damn thing you know. So yeah and like yeah, there’s just too many reports of.

07:07.48 chrisgammell Ah, yeah.

07:12.72 chrisgammell Um, yeah.

07:17.59 chrisgammell Right? yeah.

07:25.96 Dave Of dicky feeders these friction These are three D printed by the way they’re three D printed feeders. So as I think you spotted on the previous podcast. You actually see and you saw the image and you went Oh they’re they’re being three D printed. No, apparently they’re three D printed. Yeah so.

07:30.28 chrisgammell Interesting. Yeah, yeah, yeah I looked I looked at the photos at least but that could have been promotional or early photos versus production. Yeah, interesting. Yeah.

07:45.26 Dave Yeah, which is fine if they work right? But yeah nah anyway, um, an update from the previous show when we talked about is I did actually put a bid on on a local used machine. Um, and it came with 44 yamaha feeders.

07:48.96 chrisgammell I guess.

07:57.89 chrisgammell No interesting. Oh Wow. Okay.

08:04.72 Dave Right? It was like like it was yeah it was the real deal right? and it was a desktop one and I would have had to drive to canberra to get it but fine. Okay I could do a road trip right? to get it and you know and um, a rent a Ue yep and well actually I did actually check.

08:10.93 chrisgammell Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, rent a Ute.

08:22.90 Dave The I car I did actually measure the car and it might have just fitted in the car. It’s ah it’s more of like the awkwardness because it weighs like one hundred and ten Kilos so it’s more like the awkwardness of trying to like slide it in there and you know stuff like that. So it it it? Yeah, so well don’t care about that. It’s an old car but you know, um.

08:25.77 chrisgammell Oh okay I know? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, not hang up the car to ah at it.

08:41.43 Dave Yeah, so we weren’t yeah so it it would have actually fitted the problem is getting it anyway. I could have figured out the transport right? And so I unfortunately I should have hit the buy it now button. Okay because the guy like there was a make an offer thing so I went. Oh yeah, I’ll make an offer So I made a you know quite a generous offer on it.

08:51.31 chrisgammell Me.

08:59.50 Dave Um, but it it was below the selling price. So I waited for the guy to get back to me and then he didn’t get back to me and then the it it just vanished the actual ebay listing just vanished right? So um I contacted him said hey yeah, what’s going on you know and he said oh no, we decided to keep it. It’s like oh damn.

09:08.14 chrisgammell Yep.

09:17.94 Dave So even even if I hit the Bowat now button and like paid for it straight away I think he would have re-nigged on it anyway. So you know anyway, yeah, and and that yeah it was a use machine. Um was it the charm high or something which yeah I know they got a bad. Oh no, it’s some variation you know it.

09:19.59 chrisgammell Yeah. Yeah.

09:36.47 Dave It is one of the chinese ones but it’s one of the better ones. But yeah, like but but but it uses yamaha feeders right? So it’s one of the ones. Yeah, and okay and it came with like forty yamaha feeders for goodness sake. So I’m like like and it was only like 3 3 grand or something.

09:37.35 chrisgammell But then yamaha feeders Interesting Interesting. Yeah.

09:48.18 chrisgammell And maybe you should just ah contact that person and just be like hey you want to build some boards.

09:53.96 Dave Yeah, right? Well ah well I’ve already got my assembly guy up the coast. You know I’ve already got my assembly guy for what board assembled you know? So so’s no problem. Um, hey I’ve got one I’ve got one in the business park here. There’s an assembly house in the business park here. You know I can just walk.

09:55.56 chrisgammell And come down I can do some videos and yeah may okay, they go? Yeah, Okay, sure sure. Okay. No there you go Boom done. Okay, So what’s the problem here Man just go talk to that person again.

10:11.63 Dave Down the road and have my boards assembled. It’s not the same. You know what I’m making myself Anyway, yeah so um, yes I was all hyped about that.

10:19.58 chrisgammell Okay, well.

10:24.58 Dave And was all ready to go. You know I was planning my trip I was checking out you know, ah you know prices to hire utes and stuff that you know I was like I was going to go yeah know and like I was happy to pay the original price like if he wanted to haggled on the price I would have paid the full price right? And um, yeah, and he just know Damn it.

10:38.92 chrisgammell Um.

10:43.48 Dave So that one fell through and like and they’re so rare here. That’s the problem right? Yeah, yeah, well you can buy secondhand pick and place machines here, but you get them through like there’s 1 or 2 big dealers and no, you’ll be paying 20 grand for one so you won’t be able to get like a used desktop one for.

10:45.16 chrisgammell And yeah, yeah I think that’s the thing they haven’t been imported right.

10:56.30 chrisgammell Um I see oh.

11:02.88 Dave You know under 5 grand no isn’t gonna happen. So this was yeah rare as hens teeth, especially one with that many feeders and I think they were genuine yamaha feeders. So who you know anyway. Ah boy I don’t know whether I should just go for it and yeah.

11:12.95 chrisgammell If yeah. Oh well, there goes that dream I think you should just build some honestly you should just build something I think you got to you got to get those muscles flexing again you know think about it like the gym right? This is your couch to five K but it’s a couch to building this all icon of widget. Yeah yeah I like build something like.

11:22.56 Dave Yeah.

11:29.54 Dave And bill as in build something or actually design a product you talking to build build in right.

11:36.76 chrisgammell It all the way through get it all the way through to a a yeah you know of actual build product. No I think you should I think you should hand place it I think you should feel the pain. Yeah I think you should I think that I think this is an important.

11:39.70 Dave But using my own using my own pick and place machine. You think I should just buy 1 and just try and no I don’t want to hand place the bloody things anymore. No no screw that.

11:56.36 chrisgammell Important thing because it also gives you you know you could do. Basically if you hand place your first set of boards is basically you have about 6 hours or however long it takes to hand place the first couple boards or board or two whatever that is when you’re dreaming up all the dfm things because you’re going off fuckinging.

12:05.15 Dave Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

12:12.56 chrisgammell Why did I make this such a small resistor. You know like this is like the best way to do Dfm is to experience the pain of of your design decisions I’m saying a new thing I’m not saying I know that you’re talking about building the old thing I’m saying build a new thing.

12:17.43 Dave I Dude I’ve I’ve already done that I’ve already done that many many times and using why it’s the same pain. The pain doesn’t feel anything different just because it’s a new design. What is its.

12:28.79 chrisgammell You said you, you were saying the whole reason I wanted to do this sure it does. Yeah, it does it gives it gives you that that that new set of of grumbles that you know you can use to revise your design. You said that you wanted to do this.

12:35.54 Dave So it doesn’t.

12:42.46 Dave Right? So you’re saying the new the new set of grumbles is more valuable than the memorized grumbles.

12:51.29 chrisgammell That’s right memorize grumbles. Well the memorized grumbles have probably already made their way into your design as you updated your your ah your microcurrent. But you said that you wanted to get a pick in place to inspire more design I’m saying you should just go and make a small design and then that’ll also.

12:53.77 Dave Right? right? yep.

13:07.77 chrisgammell You know kickstart the process you know.

13:07.91 Dave Yes, right? Yeah, true true. All right in the meantime I’m looking out for a pick and place machine. So if anyone sees one? Um, yeah, and that that’s how I found the one that um one of my ah viewers Um, sent me an email.

13:13.44 chrisgammell Okay, yeah I think that’s interesting. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

13:21.72 chrisgammell Oh well.

13:23.41 Dave And said hey check out this because the whole ebay hey ebay like watch this thing is all screwed up now. So it’s like I don’t know what they did do it but none of my watch list bloody work anymore. So yeah, if if you certainly if you know of 1 please email me? Yep yep.

13:27.90 chrisgammell Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, send dava a secretive message. Pick and place flies at midnight.

13:46.53 Dave Because if if if 1 pops up I will nab it even if I don’t have a design ready to do it and then where’s to put it right because I originally might might my bunker which is in another part of the business park right? I I can walk there but you know it’s like.

13:50.89 chrisgammell Got it? yep.

14:04.80 chrisgammell Sure sure Sir now.

14:05.90 Dave I’ve got to get off my Ars and walk there right? whereas my dungeon is downstairs and so I’m thinking. Ah no, maybe I can put it in the dungeon downstairs because that would be easier. You know I can just go downstairs and you know? Yeah yeah, so I think that might be better.

14:15.82 chrisgammell Um, yep, well while you procrastinate buying a pickin place I am procrastinating digging into this this chip that we talked about on the show I think maybe the last time as well. I finally I did get the boards in the ¢10

14:23.32 Dave Ah.

14:33.20 Dave No, mine’s mine still I have to check my P O box but no mine must night hasn’t turned up yet. So no must be on the slow boat goodzunai. Yep.

14:33.11 chrisgammell Risk five chip. Do you get yours yet somewhere somewhere in the eeth ether. Yeah yeah, the ah the board maker is Quizzin The Tech Q S Z N T E c.

14:51.16 chrisgammell But the reason I’m holding off is because there’s only ah I had figured stupidly I didn’t look at this software tool chain because of course I Why would I um I had figured there was like a gcc port. For this thing you know I thought I was going to be able to like ah you know, pull down some open source tooling and get it going? No ah no, that’s not how it works. There’s basically.

14:51.40 Dave Ah, ah.

15:09.89 chrisgammell 1 ah moon river I think it’s called M O U N River Moon something moon um and ah, it’s like ah eclipse-based windows windows only ide and there is a risk 5 compiler that targets this chip specifically. But there’s nothing else. That’s it. That’s all you get.

15:12.19 Dave All right Morn river.

15:20.95 Dave Right.

15:28.69 Dave Ah I could have sworn. They mentioned a gcc compiler on that page. We mentioned last time but okay, ah.

15:29.48 chrisgammell Basically so.

15:35.69 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, or maybe it’s just not out in the I don’t know all I’ve seen so far for it and you know it’s been limited I found like a channel out of Brazil who was doing some stuff with these parts and um.

15:38.85 Dave Brought.

15:50.58 chrisgammell Not much else. There’s there’s not much in the internet about it yet. So it’s at guy in our show talking about it and then the the the cnx page where we is announced. Yeah, yeah, so I’m sure I’m sure there’s going to like I saw saw a bunch of people talking about buying these parts when when it was announced on Cnx.

15:51.63 Dave Right? Okay, is it and that’s entirety of the internet talking right? Got it boy.

16:10.38 Dave Yep.

16:10.40 chrisgammell Um, the the blog. So I’m sure we’re going to see stuff soon. But I’m not exactly ah you know a bleeding edge kind of person myself Dave when it comes to firmware. So I got to.

16:15.94 Dave Yeah, well well, that’s the thing before I mention the ¢3 pudu microcontroller it was like well there there was nothing out there on it. You know and then all of a sudden. Well everyone knows that there’s these.

16:26.50 chrisgammell Ah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, is there more tooling around it now too like I think that’s really the key thing when it starts to open up on tooling side.

16:32.84 Dave ¢3 microbes and they’re starting to use them and you know yeah.

16:42.46 Dave Or I think yeah there was a oh it’s been so long since I’ve worked on it now. Um I was going to get back into it recently because I’ve got my I’ve got a project series that I’m working on which is the bomb timer thing sorry not a bomb timer.

16:55.42 chrisgammell Oh yeah, right? Not a bomb. Not a bomb. Not a bomb. Okay.

17:00.20 Dave Ah, was probably going to shoot part 3 of that today maybe but part 4 of that might be um, ah actually get in a ¢3 micro to actually control it. So yeah, yeah, because ah part three will be like showing.

17:12.70 chrisgammell Ah, there you go cool. Yeah yeah I.

17:19.86 Dave A design that requires like 20 ttl chips or something to actually do it and I can shrink those 20 yeah ttl chips into one three cent micro so yeah

17:23.94 chrisgammell Um, oh right? right? right? yeah.

17:29.45 chrisgammell Great yep cool. Well, that’ll be that’s there. There’s your there’s your first there’s your first product man that not a bomb timer kit. Um, ah.

17:40.39 Dave I Don’t think anyone wants a not a bomb time a kit. Ah oh boy Yeah, right, get a knock on the door by people in sunglasses. You know, yeah now. Ah now boy.

17:44.83 chrisgammell Even if they do I don’t know if you should tell it to them.

17:51.66 chrisgammell Yeah, ah, no yeah, yeah, no, it is it I mean it is interesting seeing like what’s out there though like this and I should really know the name of the the part I think it’s RV 32 maybe even know how I find it.

17:56.92 Dave All right.

18:08.36 Dave Like aren’t yeah.

18:08.43 chrisgammell on on here is it this came from New Jersey somewhere oh there it is is it? Oh it’s it’s a CHCH 32 that’s what it is CH 32 because it’s done by so WCH is the company out of China. So.

18:21.23 Dave Got it? Yes, yes, that’s right? Yep anyway I’ll do a video on it when my kit comes in I’m sure I’ll you know do a hello world or something and see if I can Toggle some pins now. Okay, not right.

18:28.29 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah.

18:34.31 chrisgammell Cool encourage people to make open source tooling. It would really help me out. Okay.

18:41.90 Dave And right some nurdle ride a gcc port is ah gcc the main 1 or are there others. Yeah there there other are open source c compilers.

18:44.23 chrisgammell Yeah, sure bingo.

18:53.20 chrisgammell Are the other compilers. Um, Lll Vm I believe is one as well is that right? lvm? Yeah, maybe that’s not the compiler itself. Maybe that’s just the stuff around it.

18:58.72 Dave Brought.

19:07.37 Dave Okay, not cober, not right? Let’s just stick with Gcc yeah, right? okay.

19:10.47 chrisgammell Yeah, um, oh clang is another one I guess I don’t you know, mostly like I said I’m I’m just using other people’s stuff. So yeah.

19:23.93 Dave All right I’ll encourage people to do a gcc port just for just for you. So yep, no worries I did install linux the other day. Yes I installed dbn 11 yep.

19:26.70 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, thanks! Thanks! Dave.

19:36.67 chrisgammell Really tell me about that. What for okay onto ah just to a computer a desktop.

19:43.10 Dave Which a onto an old dumpster ah computer. Yep old dumpster dell at the request of my um it Penguin Um, yeah so I’m going to set up a yeah, a local mirrored.

19:53.78 chrisgammell Is it.

20:01.43 Dave Secure backup for my server so that’s the plan. Yeah.

20:02.24 chrisgammell Yeah, okay, that’s good idea so little like kind of just sip down data and have have a local copy if things go really long. Yeah yeah.

20:09.98 Dave Yes, it has have a local copy I mean I it’s already style stored on 2 different locations but you know I don’t physically have it myself so you know yeah I thought yeah so um, and and and because it’s all ah secure he said like he can’t do it.

20:20.89 chrisgammell Yeah, it’s interesting.

20:26.23 Dave Outside of a secure server because that breaks all the security of his automated backup systems and everything right? So that’s why yeah he said if you install dbn Eleven then I’ve given him backdoor access to dbn Eleven um this box So then he can set it up and configure it and yeah.

20:28.10 chrisgammell Oh got it? Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah.

20:42.13 chrisgammell Cool.

20:45.29 Dave It’ll be Auto mirrored and you know one of those incremental backup things. So yeah.

20:48.23 chrisgammell Yeah, it isn’t so so I’m doing a training on the fourteenth of December so I’ve been doing trainings in person I do want a supercon and now I’m doing 1 remote again and when I had people signing up for it I asked you know just like what is your operating system I asked what the parts they work on all all that kind of normal stuff. You’d think.

20:57.50 Dave Now.

21:05.50 Dave Right.

21:07.53 chrisgammell You know, just kind of get a feel for what people and you know pretty consistently I’ve seen like 60 plus percent are like windows users for embedded and like I’ve been linux only for a year or 2 now and um I’m I’m okay with it. But I know that like the industry is still.

21:16.97 Dave Yep.

21:24.58 Dave That that that that doesn’t surprise me because you know people ask me oh what earn just she limiting I got no reason to use linux none like personally I got 0 right.

21:26.52 chrisgammell Pushing forward with windows windows. First yeah.

21:31.57 chrisgammell Yeah, well and that’s fine and like honestly it it. It is a It’s a personal preference too right? I feel like that’s such a big piece that people leave out is like it comes I think it’s like you know it’s what you’re using every day So like whatever you’re most comfortable with is great I’m actually just most excited that there’s. Cross-platform support in a lot of tooling now like vs code and even eclipse tools are often. You know, compiled for each operating system which is like that’s all I’ve ever wanted right? like I want people to have choice. Um, and I hope that each each saw you know it’s It’s a.

21:49.32 Dave Right.

21:55.60 Dave Oh.

22:04.83 chrisgammell Burden on the software maintainers of course right? And like I you know I hear from the kaiket project about that but like but I think that that ultimately makes it more accessible everybody and you know there’s just you never know what’s going to be out there. Um, oh sure I mean yeah.

22:06.55 Dave Nope.

22:12.64 Dave Yeah, but people keep bitching on about bloody linux as in like I have to like like I’m like I’m doing it wrong I’m doing it wrong if I don’t use linux. It’s like no piss off right? No I be using windows for like what 30 years

22:22.69 chrisgammell No, no, no, no no I think that’s I don’t think that’s right, Yeah, exactly.

22:32.30 Dave It works just fine. Yes I don’t bother upgrading to windows eleven because why I don’t need to windows 10 has been working for how longs windows 10 been out right? It’s been working fine for like a decade right.

22:37.87 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, so but the thing I’m curious about though is like it seems like in the industry as well like that that is also like embedded tooling generally is still very windows focused and yet for a lot of the stuff that I.

22:52.23 Dave Yeah.

22:57.17 chrisgammell That I think about like people needing to do often I’m surprised that.

22:58.46 Dave Yeah, because you’re in the because you’re in the Hobby Realm You know you’re in that sort of you know Realm really where where there’s a yeah, there is a rather large percentage of people dicking around with linux and you know all that’s their primary system. Yep.

23:06.54 chrisgammell Well not for work.

23:14.88 chrisgammell Oh oh, that’s why you’re saying I see it for the linux side. Yeah yes I see yes I think that um there is that but but what I’m asking though is is the the windows focus right? like like historically how did that become such a big thing. You know what I mean was it just the.

23:17.24 Dave Right.

23:26.89 Dave How do windows become a big thing.

23:31.23 chrisgammell And I know windows is ah I know what windows was a big thing but I’m saying as the default tooling for many of the chip companies that are out there right? like many of the chip companies didn’t offer well windows. Yeah.

23:38.42 Dave Because Windows is the platform. It’s like altium designer right? when like that that was originally on dos right? What do you go to after that you went to windows right? that was like that was it was the platform. It was the only platform right? really.

23:50.29 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah I guess I guess if you’re trying to hit the biggest The biggest squath of people. Hu yeah sure. Yeah.

23:58.31 Dave It was it was Mac and windows it was Mac and windows there was you know? Yeah Unix was around back then right? but now that was some obscure university thing right? Um, so no, you know it’s no windows was was the only. Was was the solid choice. It was the only choice really it was Mac or windows choose your choose your poison and Mac had its own. You know? Yeah of course.

24:16.65 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah I guess I guess that makes sense from a you know like they would have wanted to target the biggest audience so then they would have felt like even if they even if there were benefits to having kind of like finer grain control on a command line basis like I don’t know if you’ve ever done any like.

24:30.88 Dave No.

24:35.56 chrisgammell Command line compiling windows is just very frustrating for me. It’s just like doing that from the windows command prompt is like yeah yeah, not for me. Yeah.

24:39.70 Dave Well I have I’ve done some and yeah, no, it’s not yeah I know but you know that isn’t its thing That’s not its job I’ve I’ve had to do it because there are some people who just write Command line tools for windows right? Well for dos. It’s not really well.

24:51.40 chrisgammell Um, yeah.

24:55.91 chrisgammell Yeah, true. Yeah.

24:59.77 Dave Windows is the operating I don’t know is dos still the underlying operating system. It’s like no, it’s not. It’s win. It’s It’s actually all based on win nt I think I think it’s.

25:02.12 chrisgammell No I don’t think so yeah.

25:46.38 Dave On a windows machine. Do you want fat which is the old school file allocation table dos right? Or do you want Ntfs right? which is nt which is windows nt file system. There is no windows eleven file system. There’s no windows ten file system. There’s no.

25:58.55 chrisgammell Um.

26:03.52 Dave Windows Xp file system right? It’s nt so it’s all based on the so the operating system itself is windows nt I think that’s what I’m getting at yeah I think it is but anyway, whatever.

26:12.13 chrisgammell That yeah I don’t know I don’t know. Yeah it. So Anyways, I I think it’s um, I’ve made the shift I’ve been interested to kind of just I think some of it is like my personal you know, kind of bias on it just because I’m now working on linux stuff all day and So. Kind of looking back in my old self and and that sort of thing. So anyways, it’s It’s not like I said it’s not right or wrong. It’s it’s ah it’s just be what people prefer and like I said I I think it’s actually really great that all the chip companies are kind of they’re all producing tooling that works on multiple platforms I Think that’s the most important thing. So.

26:32.56 Dave Huh.

26:45.93 Dave Sure Yep, but you you are going to cop the less grief the less grief you are going to cop less least amount of grief If you have a windows if you only had to release one version you would release it for windows.

26:49.13 chrisgammell Yeah.

26:55.24 chrisgammell Um, least yeah yeah I think that’s right and and increasingly so I think a lot of the chip companies are moving to vs code versus eclipse as well. Which is.

27:03.71 Dave Right? You’re going to have the least amount of grief. So.

27:12.32 chrisgammell Ah, like vs code. It’s nice. It’s kind of busy. It’s like you know and but so is eclipse to be honest. So.

27:17.56 Dave Right? Hey and vs code is that’s under linux as well is it? Oh yeah, yep yep I can see Yep yeah.

27:28.30 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, that’s cross-platform to work on macaclinus Actually the really cool thing I don’t know if if you’ve been on. You know I know you’re not in Github much. But if you if you go to a git Repo I’m sure you people know what’s coming if they’ve you’ve heard this before if you could go to ah a git repository.

27:36.21 Dave A.

27:43.69 chrisgammell Then you hit the the period key. It’s pretty cool. You should do that I me here. Let me send you a link I’ll sending a link in the chat here. Not sure. Yeah, okay, it’s in the chat. The yeah.

27:49.56 Dave Github right? Okay oh I was going to go to my own github. But okay, you can send me a link send me link. Oh it’s in the chat. Okay, but we got 2 different systems going on here. Github.

28:04.80 chrisgammell This works that’s not working you supposed to go to Repo and then you hit usually hit period. Maybe I’m doing this wrong. The the link I sent you is a repo. It’s a repository right? So that’s like a link to a bunch of code. Yep.

28:05.81 Dave What do I do.

28:15.59 Dave Where’s repo. Oh yeah, okay, right? Yes so I’m in here. Yes, now What do I do.

28:24.58 chrisgammell Now you usually hit period and it should go. You have to be logged in Anyways, it should actually it actually pops up a vs code window in the browser as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah I should have I should.

28:31.60 Dave I hit period as in dot no nothing happens. Nothing happens. Sorry.

28:42.25 chrisgammell Should have tried this ah should have tried this first. It’s supposed to open up a vs code in the browser. Yeah yeah.

28:45.55 Dave Ah, what was supposed to happen visualize it for us. Oh okay, oh okay, well you would have to select a file first wouldn’t you no no yeah yeah.

28:56.45 chrisgammell No, no, no, it actually like pops up ah like a you know vs code is like an Id right? So it actually pops up. Ah the file navigation on the left side. It actually pops up the code. Maybe you have to be enough like maybe you’re right? Actually maybe it does have to be a file.

29:01.49 Dave Right? Yep, maybe maybe maybe have to be signed in hang on I’ll sign in. Oh yep, you have to be signed in setting up your web editor there you go? Yep, it did absolutely It didn’t even tell me.

29:16.86 chrisgammell It’s 19 in. Yeah there you go.

29:20.75 Dave Before like it’d be nice if you go oh and an editor will pop up if you sign in. Okay, right? E go okay that is pretty cool. Okay so I’m now into your goliath esp Thingama Bob right? And where’s your main.

29:25.18 chrisgammell Ah, yeah, that would be good. Yeah yeah, yeah.

29:31.71 chrisgammell Yeah I was just the first link that I had I mean so I was yeah.

29:38.33 Dave Your main dot.

29:42.20 chrisgammell Ah, um, my my my login’s still not working so I’m I’m getting authentication code like usual actually Alicia K chris over at embedded fm we’re talking about this as well. Chris is talking about the ah the workspaces thing.

29:43.48 Dave Bloody components. There’s no main. Okay. Not okay.

29:57.55 chrisgammell And it’s pretty cool because you can actually so like now you have ah a web-based ide right? So like you could do that sort of thing and then some of the stuff I’ve been working on I’ve been working on some containers where you could basically like install your entire tool chain into a container and then link that and use that on the github man.

30:00.85 Dave Yeah, right.

30:09.30 Dave Oh.

30:16.20 Dave Right? So I’m actually in vs Studio at the moment am I vs code right? It’s web vs code because don’t because they own Github don’t they right? Yeah, okay.

30:17.25 chrisgammell Nothing is working on my phone right now. Oh turn to.

30:23.97 chrisgammell Vs code. Yeah, it’s like the web vs code. Yeah.

30:31.28 chrisgammell Ah, Microsoft owns Github that’s right? Yeah yeah, but actually you can install this on your own stuff as well, right? So actually um, that training I mentioned I do I have like a web version. How to explain it.

30:34.50 Dave That’s why it’s integrated right? okay.

30:47.34 chrisgammell Basically all the tooling is installed on the server that I run and then you basically log into a browser like a desktop in the browser and then you can actually open vs code from in there as well. Which is pretty cool. Yeah.

30:52.82 Dave Yep.

30:59.49 Dave Ah, cool. Okay I didn’t know that that was that was pretty groovy.

31:04.66 chrisgammell Yeah, so this is like a trend so like Github’s doing this. There’s another one called gitpod does this? um and there’s like all these toing companies. Where basically you you don’t just you know it’s almost kind of like how we’ve talked about like.

31:09.89 Dave Rot.

31:13.42 Dave Some of my codes on the lab. Some of my codes on Gitlab I Think yeah, it does okay.

31:20.63 chrisgammell Oh gitlab. Yep so they have stuff as well. Um, and um, and so the idea though is that you actually like store your entire tool chain with your code. So you think about like the problem of not having your tools up-to date right? If you have like an old version.

31:30.57 Dave Right? right. Yeah, yeah, of course. Yeah.

31:37.94 chrisgammell An ide on your your laptop or something then you or you you you have to reformat your laptop and your code was built on this old stuff and it doesn’t work on the new version. You actually store all the tooling with your your code as well. Which is um, really great for like long-term stuff you know a lot of people say like oh I could just make a you know a Vm.

31:48.31 Dave Got it? okay.

31:56.19 chrisgammell And store everything in there and it’s like yeah you can do that. But that’s actually really like heavy because then you need to have like a whole windows image or linux image and basically all of the Ui elements in addition to just the compiler and you know the the tooling that pops out of it. So yeah, yeah, as it’s.

32:07.00 Dave And okay, right? And okay I don’t know how to do it on my gitlab because I’ve got my micro supply code in gitlab and it’s I don’t know.

32:20.19 chrisgammell Oh okay, yeah.

32:25.37 Dave Well can I just do dot I can dot.dotworks yeah yeah dot works yeah hang on making review changes browser. Yep yep, source yep there it is main dot cpp. Yep yep, although it’s not as color syntax highlighted.

32:25.84 chrisgammell Maybe yeah, Oh yeah, how nice the new Standard. Oh Cool. Yep.

32:42.70 chrisgammell It’s pretty neat.

32:45.15 Dave Like the one over on Git hub. Ah yeah, yeah, which is kind of disappointing. Although it’s got one. It puts the text in.

32:48.96 chrisgammell It doesn’t detect that it’s a C plus plus file. Yeah.

33:01.93 Dave Quotes it puts those in red but everything else is just in black. So ah.

33:06.30 chrisgammell Ah, yeah, maybe it knows only certain extensions or something it’d be Yeah I mean you think you think they know that but you know yeah yeah.

33:10.90 Dave Well, it’s CCPlus plus so cpp. Yeah, you would think it would Dan like yeah think you’d know it or at least do basic syntax highlighting. Um okay, cool cool bananas there you go I learned something.

33:21.42 chrisgammell Yeah.

33:27.58 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, yeah, so ah, Ollicia and Chris were talking about that on recent show and um, yeah, it’s pretty cool I mean so ah code spaces is like the github thing where you basically not only now when you upload your ah you know, basically your.

33:28.34 Dave Excellent.

33:44.80 chrisgammell Like a script file that basically says here’s you know, go install all of these prerequisites and then go install this tool chain you store that with your file but then it’ll also like rent you servers right? So basically you know like Microsoft also runs azure. Ah.

33:50.20 Dave Right.

34:01.41 chrisgammell Started by former guests Ray Azzi among others at Microsoft um, and and so you can basically like you could really juice it up. You can do it. You can throw like through to 32 cores at a compilation if you wanted to that sort of thing. So it’s pretty cool.

34:01.56 Dave What’s that.

34:13.86 Dave Okay, got it excellent all right? Yeah, that boring. No this is not the embedded and power. Sorry yep.

34:19.48 chrisgammell Yeah, code code and stuff. I know I know. And yeah, it’s all right.

34:32.63 Dave News Do we have any yeah, any other news.

34:38.58 chrisgammell Oh I don’t know um in my life but no Christmas lights you were talking about you putting up Christmas lights. That’s that’s some news in my life I realize that is not what you were talking about. But.

34:40.99 Dave They.

34:47.16 Dave Yeah, ni. Well we were just briefly talking about this before the show. How if you wanted to automate your lights. How would you do it. It’s like how many off-theshelf solutions would there be for automating something like that.

35:05.54 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, there’s a there’s a lot more than you used to be. Yeah.

35:05.79 Dave Dozens and dozens right? Yeah, ah you know it’s just and and there’s so many that aren’t there’s so many automated systems that aren’t even intended for that application. But you could certainly use them for that application right? and there’s and there’s just countless ones. How do you decide? which.

35:17.31 chrisgammell This is.

35:24.36 Dave You know system to use to you know I guess you just have to I don’t know pick one read the reviews on the Christmas lights forum so and get the costs. Yeah yeah.

35:28.92 chrisgammell Read the reviews. Yeah yeah, personally I’m not to I’m not doing that my old coworker. Yeah I guess So yeah, yeah, yeah, right right? Yeah I yeah.

35:39.75 Dave Oh no, this one sucks at so many issues with the drivers and I no it’s you know ye.

35:48.87 chrisgammell It’s it’s it’s reached a fever pitch to like the fact that it is commercially available for a lot of people like my my old coworker back in my keyley days. So it must have been like 2010 it was like before a lot of the commercial systems were available. He built his all from scratch and like and like he had like relays and he was switching all himself and you know.

36:00.87 Dave Yeah, right? yep and you use your own micro when you code it from scratch and yep yep, no I Yeah you totally wouldn’t do that now I mean there’s just so many? No no, no yeah so many.

36:07.90 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, totally yeah, it was no these days I Hell no no, it’s not worth it. Yeah I mean there’s so many systems that are out there in night. They’ yeah but it depends what you’re interested in the project for.

36:20.29 Dave Yeah, know, but and you could use you use even any. Ah any of the off the shelf automated things National instruments you know automated I O cards and you know everything else right? if you wanted to spend an absolute fortune right? No but but I’m saying you could right.

36:28.97 chrisgammell No god national instruments by god Dave. Yeah yeah, you totally could yeah, it would be really really expensive my goodness yeah install my old.

36:38.60 Dave Right? Ah, but yeah, like you know there’s just so many systems like that.

36:46.40 chrisgammell A B distributed control system work in you know, ah in ah in a control closet somewhere. And yeah I mean control some some big relays and just really really flop on the current. You know? yeah there you go. That’s right? yeah.

36:49.53 Dave Yeah, no lader logic wasn’t there wasn’t this something coming ah was it Arduino released is that on the list is that what was that.

37:06.37 chrisgammell That is on the list. Yeah.

37:07.22 Dave It’ ah, that’s that’s where I saw it. Okay, it was on the list arduino released a now I’m going to have to find it now. It’s a programmable logic controller. So it’s a plc Arduino and Andwe and yeah, aduino unveils the opter the first micro. Ps.

37:16.98 chrisgammell Yeah.

37:23.27 chrisgammell Yeah.

37:26.39 Dave Plc How is it the first micro Plc for the industrial internet of things That’s that’s got to be a bullshit claim come on.

37:29.21 chrisgammell I Think no matter what they’re doing. There’s yeah that is that is definitely I mean I think it’s I think they’re saying size size. Maybe I don’t know maybe they I don’t know there’s no yeah so I’ve talked I’ve talked to aduino about this and I know some of the folks there and and they’re good folks I’m a little little confused about what they’re.

37:38.78 Dave Ah, no come on. There’s got to be something 9

37:46.80 chrisgammell You know? so I am glad to see actually that they’re they’re embracing later logic I Think that’s what you know they’re trying to go into this really industrial segment and I thought they were going to be asking people to do like Arduino coding and I was like that’s just not how people operate you know.

37:51.72 Dave Yep.

37:55.60 Dave 9 I and yeah, the that’s what I thought at first I I I actually clicked on the link and I went please say you’re doing lader logic because otherwise it’s just a joke right? and sure enough. Yep, they have yeah.

38:05.55 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah I think I think it’s kind of like table stakes for if you’re getting in the industrial industry and like you know, whatever you feel about ladder logic. It’s like that’s just what is used and so yeah I don’t yeah.

38:14.85 Dave Exactly to to control your lift. You know when when you get into lift and you hit the button and you know that’s what’s controlling your lift and other automated things you know and elevator. Okay, yeah, yeah.

38:27.58 chrisgammell Elevator for all the the non aussies or Palms. Yeah yeah, ah you know and it is.

38:33.19 Dave So yeah, um, yeah, so they support. Um, yeah, they support that they support functional block diagrams. Yeah.

38:40.31 chrisgammell It is interesting and so like Arduino I think we mentioned back when they raised a bunch of money they raised a series b for $32000000 in bosh and so like them going into the industrial industrial sector doesn’t that starts to make sense then you know like it’s like oh bosh is also industrial. So like yeah, um.

38:46.17 Dave She Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, a totally? Yes, oh yeah, no you you can get bosh Plcs you know yeahp I think you can I did I yeah.

38:57.42 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, yep, yeah yeah.

39:03.40 Dave I think I used a bosh way back in the day bosh peel see are they still making ah seamens seem okay, yeah is Semens Bosh yeah Allen all Alllan Bradley’s the well that doesn’t popped up when I googled it. No, it’s okay, yeah.

39:03.65 chrisgammell Yeah I don’t know. Yeah I mean Alllan Bradley and yeah siemens is not posh. Oh my gosh Dave somewhere somewhere half of Germany screamed out in pain. No, those are yeah I mean it would make sense to bring some of that now. So I I doubt they manufacture with their highest end facilities. You know they probably rebadge a bunch of stuff and that’s great and whatever.

39:21.85 Dave Yeah boshboshmakerplcs um yep yep

39:33.11 Dave On sorry to all you bosh Rex Roth fanboys the bosh Rex Roth ah yeah

39:39.26 chrisgammell yeah yeah I mean that’s the thing like it’s it’s its own. It’s its own submarket segment too like it’s just you know so who was a John Davis my old friend from Cleveland he was on the show many many years ago talking about. Yeah he’s in the industrial sector he sells in in that sector a lot and like it’s just.

39:48.49 Dave Me.

39:58.86 chrisgammell it’s not ah it’s it’s basically like applied electronics in like very extreme scenarios. Um, but it’s not like what’s interesting is I think arduino is going to try and pull kind of more complex stuff into that space. Yeah, and then there is already complex stuff in that space. Don’t get me wrong. But I think they’re going to try and do it kind of an as an all in one like a shrunk down kind of version. You know because Arduino is doing a bunch of machine vision stuff and linux on things and whatever. Um, so 1 thing that’s interesting about the art. Ah the opt I think is a little bit smaller but a lot of the arduino stuff is is now like it’s beefy. It’s running like you know linux.

40:23.29 Dave And.

40:34.98 chrisgammell Like a linux plus on it. Cortex M seven you know so just like really really heavy duty stuff on there so it’ll be interesting to see where that falls in the marketplace.

40:36.20 Dave Yeah, right? yep. M Yeah because people don’t realize how huge that market is right? unless you’ve worked in it like it is enormous. The the programmable logic and the programmable controls Market I Guess as is I think more of the correct.

40:54.14 chrisgammell Um, don’t yeah.

40:58.95 chrisgammell Yeah, yep.

41:02.85 Dave Term um is just absolutely enormous it. It controls all your industrial robotics and it probably helped launch the latest Artemis rocket and you know like so yeah, like nobody does this with yeah, any automated factory yep, anything that’s moving stuff like that.

41:12.97 chrisgammell You Yeah I mean every factory right? You think about any any kind of like any anything where stuff’s moving any yeah anywhere anything where there’s stuff switching. Yeah, it’s crazy. So yeah.

41:22.81 Dave Yep yep, and there’s safety inter a locks and there’s and that’s all programmable logic controls right? Nobody has like a linux Pc controlling that sort of stuff right? It’s just no, they’re embedded programmable logic controls. Yep so.

41:31.55 chrisgammell No yeah, yeah I think um, what’s interesting is I think there’s also a lot of Grand Loyalty like I can’t imagine you know like the.

41:40.89 Dave Oh yeah, yeah yeah.

41:44.86 chrisgammell Like when I imagine people so actually. Ah Jeff who I used to do the engineering commons with he was ah he’s a machine builder and like you know they kind of view my experience hearing about this. Not like that and I’ve never done this but like it does seem like it’s like you’re basically using these electronics as ah as a tool to just get the job done. It doesn’t matter.

42:02.44 Dave Yeah, totally not.

42:04.56 chrisgammell Like the you know the actual features you know and there’s not a lot of specsmanship type of stuff. It’s just can I get it can I get it at a good price and like do I understand how to use it already and so like I can’t imagine. Yeah yeah, and.

42:13.73 Dave Well, you don’t even get it and like the good price thing doesn’t even factor into it really seriously. It doesn’t yep oh I’m sure there’s you know some areas where it might but generally no.

42:24.00 chrisgammell Okay, yeah, sure sure Um, but I think about and.

42:30.10 Dave It’s like what am I experience with what is the most reliable. What has never let me down. You know, right? Yep yeah.

42:33.80 chrisgammell Yeah, right. Reliability is a big one too right? Yeah, totally and so I just think like Brand Loyalty is another thing where it’s like if you’re trying to break into that market. That’s another another tough piece of it where if you’re like even if you have a big brand name like Arduino You don’t have a big brand name in the machine space yet. So I think that’s going to be.

42:42.29 Dave Yep yep.

42:50.59 Dave Yeah, ah yeah, of course yeah, well was going to say they should have even ditched the arduino name like they’ve caught it opter have they is it the opter.

42:51.67 chrisgammell Uphill for them unfortunately but we’ll you know we’ll see where it goes I hope I Hope they do Well you know like you said is a huge market. Oh interesting. Yeah I think that’s the product name. Yeah.

43:06.80 Dave The product name is opter but they’ve still got the arduino pro branding on there I think that is not a good thing for the industrial space. Um, yeah.

43:14.22 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, yeah.

43:21.17 Dave Anyway, yeah, for those who don’t know like yeah if you’re controlling robotics or something else. You know you control in your elevator. Um, and you know things like that you want to control your rocket launch and stuff like that. You don’t want to be dick like you do like you want this to work and you want it to work for decades right. This is not this is not something you control from a general-p purposepose computer right? because general-p purposepose computers a code bloated right? there. They’re not designed specifically for the task driver issues. they’ got update you know all sorts of right? Um, they’re just not designed for that task whereas they and whereas these are embedded. Modules that are highly ah, not only high high reliability but in terms of hardware but software the firmware in there as well. Their little mini operating system that they run in there and it’s it’s just you know it’s it’s highly vetted, highly optimized for. Like it. It is never going to write and and if if you buy a bosher an Alan Bradley programmable logic controller it’s never going to lock up right? Locking up is not a thing right? Okay, well, that’s bad programming on your logic and okay.

44:24.70 chrisgammell hey hey I can get anything to lock up Dave come on bad code. Yeah yeah.

44:34.26 Dave Right? You know it’s just no, right. It is not a thing right? and and then they’ll have fallback procedures like I was in the lift the elevator the other day right? and it and it actually went to the first floor when it shouldn’t have and it stopped there for a couple of seconds. It didn’t even open the doors. It just stopped there because that’s been programmed. In as the reset level and I’ve been trapped in in the liftft before right? you know? and um, yeah, it the system resets itself after a certain amount of time and that’s its default reset position. It always goes back to that and then clunk clun clunk. It resets itself and all the senses well and and.

44:57.88 chrisgammell Um, and.

45:12.39 Dave And a and it continues on right? So yeah, it’s like yeah, you’ve got the blue screen of death. Sorry um, you know it’s It’s just oh man.

45:13.49 chrisgammell Yeah, better than better than having a reset state. That’s like now entering free free fall evaluating gravity. Yeah.

45:27.99 Dave No, it’s just that these things are just super reliable. You know the worst thing you can do when you’re controlling stuff like this is to use and a general purpose Pc to do it doesn’t matter if it’s linux doesn’t matter if it’s Pc or something else. You know it’s like Nope you’re using the wrong tool for the job So there.

45:34.80 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, yeah.

45:44.21 chrisgammell If it.

45:47.54 Dave Anyway, Program Logic controls. Great fun stuff. Um, all right.

45:49.48 chrisgammell Yeah, it’s cool see how they do I’m not realizing how when is the last time we do the show together. It’s been a while right because I skipped I skipped for that. Oh that’s what it was I skipped from Thanksgiving and then I did a show last week. Yeah, yeah, so that’s been a while.

45:57.78 Dave Now three weeks maybe yes yep yep. All right.

46:08.48 chrisgammell On the list as well. So what else was we did that one. There’s nothing one I wanted to mention punch card. No we talked about that. Um, oh this new Sony part nobody upvoted this. But this thing is a friggin beast.

46:27.24 Dave Right? Okay I know.

46:27.84 chrisgammell Like literally nobody voted this up except for me. But you know what we run the show folks guess what we get to talk about what we want the Sony alt thirteen fifty I don’t even understand so it’s on the list as cnx link. So cn next is great blog to ah Jean Pierre Jean Pierre no

46:36.12 Dave Now I’m looking at it. Yep I’m on looking at. Okay, once again, it’s internet of things folks. It’s internet of things alert warning on it.

46:46.70 chrisgammell Um, Luke John Luke John Luke oh yeah of course it is yeah but here’s the thing this thing has here listen listen to all the things this this has cortex m four cortex is mzero plus right? So you could do like a little bit of you know, sensing detection and then you you know you have your main processor. It’s got It’s got a ah dual band um cellular mode in it. It’s got Gps it’s got a 2.4 Gigahertz eight two dot fifteen f or so you could do thread or ant or whatever the other stuff it or just raw 8 o two dot 15 that 4 it’s insane.

47:07.10 Dave Now.

47:18.63 Dave Um, yeah I’m looking at the feature list now. Yeah yeah.

47:24.70 chrisgammell It’s also got a sub gig. So that means that basically so this is basically meant for like the smart Meor market which you know if you want to use it for that. Ah, but basically this thing’ going to be able to talk any of these things and it also has I think wi-fi but does it have wi-fi I think it has wi-fi for detecting location as well. Yeah integrated wi-fi ssd.

47:28.61 Dave Got it? Okay yep.

47:43.93 chrisgammell Ssd based location. So you know like your phone doesn’t normally get Gps readings to get like precise location actually gets it from hotspot like a hotspot database and seeing how close you are to other hotspots which is insane on in its own right? But it’s got all of this stuff. So this thing basically can tell you where where you’re in space I could talk to a bunch of different sensors.

47:50.80 Dave Yep.

48:02.84 chrisgammell And it can be an embedded device. It’s just it’s insane and that’s right, that’s right, that’s right? Yeah, so basically it’ll use the 2.4 gigas radio probably and then just you know listen for hotspots. But yeah, want wi-fi yeah, you know.

48:03.43 Dave It It doesn’t have wi-fi generically as a wi-fi Interface. It’s just part of the location mapping thing right? Yeah, all right, got it. And it’s got a sick and it’s got a a secure element built in as Well. So wow.

48:22.73 chrisgammell Ah.

48:27.98 chrisgammell Yep yeah I think that’s going to be I will actually be surprised when chips don’t have secure elements built in in the in the near future I Think that’s the new de Rigo of of all of these connectivity things because it’s just.

48:34.21 Dave Ah night. Okay, oh it doesn’t actually come from. Well it’s it’s a Sony part but it actually ah that looks like Sony bought and Israeli Company Cord Alta Semiconductor good stuff old tear. Yep classic. Um.

48:44.68 chrisgammell All tear. That’s right? Yep Yep Yeah yep, yep yeah no this thing is this is this is a beast I mean like I’m very excited about this part. We’ll see when it comes out and how much it costs all the other stuff but like.

48:51.94 Dave Yeah, so it looks like they they develop this Wow and all right, she’s.

49:01.32 chrisgammell Basically the twelve fifty the one that’s before this is is this one of the smallest cellular motors you can get for for I mean it’s like like twelve millimeters by twelve millimeters like it’s insane. Yeah, like how small these things are getting so and that’s actually um, that’s um, that’s this chipset. But then in ah in a.

49:09.50 Dave Right? Wow wow.

49:20.37 chrisgammell Module from Marauda. So yeah, oh yeah, everything’s external. Yeah, the antennas are are big. Yeah I mean you could do like? yeah.

49:22.85 Dave Right? That’s external antenna though right? That’s not internal antenna right night. Go because I I tore down something rees are the um I tore ah, the Bluetooth lock.

49:36.69 chrisgammell Oh interesting for bluetooth? Oh yeah, yeah, oh on the chip. Oh oh Wow What kind of range did they claim.

49:37.45 Dave I tore down the bluetooth lock here and that that used an internal antenna. Yes, it was on the chip right? It was on. It was on the chip. It was embedded on the chip. Yes, it’s all in one I got it’s. Fairly standard I thought I thought you you could get the ten meters or whatever. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was built onto the chip. Yes, yeah because I was like because it’s inside a metal can right? This is like a ah safe lock right? So it’s inside a metal a a secure metal. Can.

49:58.49 chrisgammell Yeah, ah, okay, that’s great. Yeah, that’s on the chip. That’s it. That’s very impressive. Yeah I’ve never seen that? yeah.

50:14.10 chrisgammell And.

50:15.49 Dave And I figured Well how do they get the bluetooth signal out of the not only inside the can but the safe right? because it’s into so it’s ah so it’s a sta. It’s it’s it’s inside us. Yeah, it’s inside a stainless steel case. That’s inside a steel safe.

50:21.22 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, it’s a big metal brick. Yeah yeah, some somewhere an rf engineer is is weeping.

50:33.31 Dave Right? But yeah, exactly exactly and I actually talked to the designer right? and I actually I actually talked to the designer. Yeah, he yeah phoned me up right.

50:39.36 chrisgammell Don’t understand our ref.

50:45.69 chrisgammell Um, yeah, yeah of course. Yeah.

50:48.18 Dave And we had I unfortunately didn’t want to be on camera or whatever. But you know he didn’t want to be recorded. But anyway else I was talking to him for like ages and he said and like so I thought because it uses external batteries right? So the external battery. Is outside the safe because you have to change the batteries right? So I thought aha maybe they’re using the ground wire or the positive wire as a secret you know antenna that’s part of the Bluetooth antenna and he said nope it’s on the chip and sure enough when I did the teardown it’s on the it uses this all in 1 Bluetooth chip and and the antenna is built.

51:04.63 chrisgammell Oh yeah, yep.

51:12.31 chrisgammell Um, yeah.

51:23.15 Dave Onto the chip. There is no external is no external connection. Yeah well, it’s but I don’t know how they do it inside the chip. You know I don’t know. But yeah it it. It could be like a separate layer with an actual antenna on top of the diee I I don’t know physically how they do it inside. But yeah.

51:25.57 chrisgammell You’re saying it’s a Silicon Antenna Silicon Antenna That’s crazy. Oh so it might be a like ah like a sip like a um, ah okay, all right? yeah.

51:42.61 Dave Yeah, it’s very cool and he said no we do we we don’t all we do is rely on the fact that it gets attenuated by an incredible amount and yeah have to be like thirty centimeters away from the safe for it to work but it works.

51:44.27 chrisgammell That’s very cool.

51:49.15 chrisgammell Yeah.

51:56.66 Dave And it’s like okay and well of course you know it’s going to seep out like you’re going to have the ah rf actually jumping onto the ground and and positive wires and then coming out as sort of like a passive radiator kind of thing right? So there’s going to be some ah rf happening there right? But no, it’s it’s built on the ship.

51:57.67 chrisgammell I Ah yeah.

52:07.29 chrisgammell What you I got to look this up I’d like to see this actually so the which which reviews this all Dave’s gonna send me a link. Well I’ll just check it out later but that’s that’s cool. Yeah.

52:15.16 Dave Oh okay, right? Um, yeah I Ah yep I will well okay I will save locks be out of safe locks. Yes.

52:29.53 chrisgammell Yeah, ah oh and the last thing on this part is they say that it could talk to satellites which I’m very surprised about. But I think it’s a satellite connectivity which is like way to sending messages up to satellites I think the only thing that could possibly would be with that. Is if it’s running in like the ah the sub gig radio was doing like a chirp and talking up like there’s a bunch of stuff where like Laura there’s like Laura satellites now which is super cool but also hard to hard to fathom. You know the fact that like these little tiny chips are sending stuff up to the satellites. But.

52:51.26 Dave Right.

53:00.40 Dave Yeah. Okay.

53:05.49 chrisgammell Cool I’ll take it all of the connectivity. Please thank you very much.

53:12.29 Dave Ah, crazy stuff. Yep, a artemus is coming back tomorrow is it tomorrow. Yeah.

53:12.72 chrisgammell Yeah.

53:19.31 chrisgammell Oh yeah, yeah, you did you did a like a watch video thing for that right? I didn’t I didn’t see it live I think I was traveling. Yeah, oh that’s like next week as next week

53:25.14 Dave Yes, yes, for the launch. Um I don’t know if I’ll do one for I and yeah, it’s come back on the sixteenth either or the nineteenth could be the nineteenth of December. It’s coming back and I think either yesterday. Or today don’t quote me on this I’ve been meaning to check I was mean to check before the show but it is the fiftieth anniversary of when we last set foot on the moon gene cernon last set foot on the moon. Yes I think it has been its fifty years right now.

53:48.73 chrisgammell Oh interesting. Ah it sounds like they might be on purpose. They might have done that.

53:55.80 Dave But yeah, so anyway, that’s very cool and who I have actually met by the way I’ve met gene cernon. He’s very cool. Yes I met gene cernan and he went to the moon twice not once twice. So yep, he went on apollo 10

54:00.70 chrisgammell Oh really, oh cool. Wow Man can you imagine.

54:13.17 Dave So we flew around the back of the moon did the whole dress rehearsal thing got down within 30 or five ks of the surface or something like that and then went back up and went. Yeah yep, everything seems to work and yeah.

54:22.91 chrisgammell The the Moon’s there I saw it.

54:28.15 Dave And yeah, and then Apollo Apollo eleven landed and then he commanded apollo 17 which was the last so he was like there and being being the commander. He was the first off and the last back on so he was literally the last man to set foot on the moon. So.

54:42.33 chrisgammell Ah know well cool man. Yeah, it is kind of weird that it’s been so long like but it’s good. They’re they’re doing it again I Guess that’s a.

54:46.66 Dave Yeah, hey there you go. So that’s been fifty years exactly I think and we still haven’t got back? yeah.

54:59.37 chrisgammell Good first step much like Dave reentering the world of designing electronics. Ah we were once again going to the moon and we don’t do this because it’s hard. We do it because we like doing electronics.

55:00.31 Dave Yep, ah.

55:06.88 Dave Yeah, right? Okay, it’s my it’s my moonshot because we are nerds. Oh boy, Yep, not That’s all right need more Southern twang.

55:19.19 chrisgammell Sorry for the bad Jfk accent. Ah.

55:23.99 chrisgammell No, he’s from boston man the jfk yeah jfk was that was a Boston accent. Yeah, like really heavy Boston accent. Yeah.

55:24.65 Dave You know is he is he oh he’s a Boston oh I thought he was slight. Okay, right there you go all right.

55:36.87 chrisgammell Um, what should we? ah talk about the rest of the show. Oh you know what? I want to talk about I know the grid I Want to talk about the grid. So I’m almost done with the book called the grid. Um, ah first off I found out that I looked up the author I was like oh well maybe we should have her on the show.

55:42.84 Dave Go.

55:53.80 chrisgammell And then I found out. She’s actually an anthropologist versus I thought she was going to be like an electronics nerd. But and I think you know if you do that much research on the grid you are by default but she’s actually interested in like systems and how they interconnect us like oh that’s actually and so I would still be interested in talking to her but she actually finished the book in 2016 and she moved on other projects. But.

55:54.73 Dave No, right right.

56:05.97 Dave Ah, interesting. Okay.

56:11.11 Dave No okay, right probably doesn’t yeah care anymore. Yep yep, right.

56:13.71 chrisgammell Um, yeah I don’t know how much she talks about anymore. But anyways, it’s a great book. Um I am very curious about like the you know she writes in there. A lot about the like kind of the weaknesses of the grid system and just how things are changing um with renewables entering and this was.

56:26.15 Dave A.

56:31.27 chrisgammell 2014 2015 she was writing about it came out twenty sixteen and so like and that’s just like skyrocketed in the meantime and yeah.

56:38.22 Dave Oh look the the the problem with the grid is that we take her for granted right? and especially grid security I think Grid security is hugely underrated. Um, ah recently there’s been recent news.

56:41.61 chrisgammell Oh totally? yeah.

56:52.76 chrisgammell Ah, yeah, well given that about seventy miles from here I would you say seventy miles from here some some jackasses went and shot up a a substation. Yeah I mean it was like well I mean there’s not really a reason to do it. Ah.

56:55.42 Dave Yeah, oh okay, it’s actually yeah I’m surprised that it’s taken that long I’m surprised like people haven’t done that before. No, there’s not but you know I mean I.

57:08.75 chrisgammell But there are a lot of people that are bad actors I’d say and yeah, so yeah, from that perspective I agree with you that like it is surprising. There aren’t more attacks on it and just and the interconnectedness like and how it all ties together like you know so.

57:20.79 Dave Yep, Well even from if you just even if you take out the humans out of the loop right? A solar flare could like really scraws I know they can detect those come in and they can do they can take measures. To sort of ah protect the grid I’d love to talk to an expert on that by the way. Um, that’d be yeah how to actually protect the grid if there’s a massive like Carryington event level grid right thing then? yeah I Want to know how well we’re actually protected.

57:41.12 chrisgammell Yeah, like how to actually protect for solar flares.

57:52.30 chrisgammell Um.

57:56.70 chrisgammell Yeah.

57:57.94 Dave So yeah, anyway I am my ah looks like the battery my backup battery things happening Hopefully that’ll happen this year. My home storage. Yes yes because ah fronnias have said that they’re yeah they’re going to send me a hybrid inverter. So.

58:07.30 chrisgammell Um, you are oh interesting. Yeah.

58:14.77 chrisgammell Cool. Okay.

58:17.29 Dave Umm I’m going to have a yeah I’m going to have a fronia cybrid inverter and that hooks up unfortunately, it only hooks up to 1 brand of batteries which is the chinese e y d one which which is a great battery. They’re like the biggest storage manufacturer in the world I think.

58:28.87 chrisgammell Um.

58:34.85 Dave Battery storage manufacturing. Well so they’re really good batteries and I bet. Yeah, but there’s no choice right? It it only talks to those batteries right? So so I have to buy those. They’ve got firmware on them. Yeah, you’ve got to talk to the management system right of the batteries. You’ve got ah you know? Yeah yeah, so they’ve got to be firmware.

58:34.86 chrisgammell Ah, ah yeah.

58:41.10 chrisgammell Is because they have some kind of like firmware on them that you have to I see got it.

58:53.37 Dave Have to be firmly supported. So yeah, usually when you buy a a hybrid inverter or any or a battery storage inverter system. It usually only works with one or several brands of batteries. You can’t just well yeah, you might be able to install just any kind of battery. But then the management doesn’t work and you know things like that. So yep, yeah.

59:09.88 chrisgammell Yeah.

59:12.50 Dave And then that’ll tie in with my solar analytics system as well. My solar analytic analytics system only supports one brand of Hybrid inverter for battery management and it happens to be fronnius so you know cool. Yeah, awesome. Um, so yeah, so hopefully that’s I will um.

59:21.12 chrisgammell Ah, oh that’s good. Yeah.

59:30.49 chrisgammell Um, yeah.

59:30.52 Dave Actually straight after this I’ve got to email them and they said they’d send me one I went yeah beauty. Okay I’ll start ordering batteries and find someone to install the whole thing and put some more panels up and so I’ll have yeah a battery storage.

59:42.36 chrisgammell Yeah I think I think after reading this book I think the the main thing I feel is just kind of like the the fact that we’re susceptible to you know like anything that the grid happens you know we’re all tied to get to this grid right? and anything that happens on there a normal outage. Whatever um.

59:54.37 Dave Yeah.

59:59.96 chrisgammell We’re just all impacted by it and obviously my entire likelihood is based on electricity not to mention my hot water and everything else you know like it’s just everything’s electrified and so it’s like yeah yeah, it’s everything. Yeah yeah, totally yeah.

01:00:09.28 Dave Everyone’s is it’s not just your daily thing. It’s like if the grid goes down everything stops like transport stops right? You know? Yes, Okay, we’ve got some fuel you know to power the trucks. But how do the how do they pump the fuel into the trucks electricity.

01:00:23.36 chrisgammell Right? exactly? Yeah yep, yep Yeah yeah, yeah, exactly exactly.

01:00:26.17 Dave Right? I mean you know it’s like everything stops so you start starving pretty quickly right? if the grid like if like if there’s a solar flare that literally takes down the grid for a month we are screwed. We are absolutely screwed.

01:00:37.87 chrisgammell Yeah, well. Okay, so so this we were you know we were talking about the you know, bad actor events and stuff like that and actually I just got to this part last night and I found it on my my my copy here. So here’s some of the numbers in 2014. There were 77 serious power outages. And the United States due to severe weather and that’s so so serious power outages not just like small things another 17 due to fuel shortages usually the supply result of supply chain problems like congestion on rails and 66 that were the result of physical attack.

01:00:57.40 Dave Right? right.

01:01:08.34 Dave Hang on fuel. How do the how do the fuel problems happen. Oh like Okay, you’re talking about coal. You’re not talking about substation right? Okay talking about right.

01:01:14.39 chrisgammell Ah, like coal coal wasn’t delivered to a plant. Yeah, that’s right? Yeah yeah, but this is also substations 66 were the result of physical attack only two of which were cyber attacks. Yeah did did you know there was also.

01:01:25.92 Dave Wow wow 66 how like because apparently this recent event where they shot it up is the first time somebody shot it up. So how how are these other physical events happening. No.

01:01:31.75 chrisgammell Yeah here we go in April of Twenty thirty I I had not heard about this in April nope. Nope nope here we go in April of 2013 I hadn’t heard about this in April Twenty Thirteen a vanload of mass men with submachine guns shot the rural installation to bits. Not at random they targeted key bits of the substations and mechanics like snipers against infrastructure shot by shot destroying 17 of the substations large transformers. These men were never caught and their know-how and malice made an impression though. Nobody talks about it. Our physical and infrastructure is not just exposed to weird weather. It’s also shockingly vulnerable to weird people well said.

01:01:54.20 Dave Whoa whoa.

01:02:08.11 Dave There is a film in that there’s a film like there’s a I would watch that right? Yeah, but what was their might like what was their motive. What? what.

01:02:09.83 chrisgammell Like this is out there surely but they’ve never caught these guys. There’s nothing there but like like how did nobody knows like they took out Silicon Valley like it like it was probably something around that I mean maybe who I have no idea.

01:02:26.46 Dave Was was something happening at the time was there like was it was there an election was there ah was there something else that they were trying to like shut down wait there. There has to be there has to be.

01:02:29.60 chrisgammell I don’t know April of 2013 nope yeah I’m sure there there’s writing about this I’m sure but like I know I know but like this and like the fact that like they’re just now putting up fences you know, like around some of these places as well. Yeah, and like.

01:02:45.54 Dave Right? right? Yeah fences Well fences aren’t going to keep out the boards you know because they’re chain link fences right? I do understand them eyes I Speak fluent American Yep yeah, ah.

01:02:48.27 chrisgammell And that’s that’s right, that’s right, that’s right folks Dave Understands American yes yeah and and like so this is one segment of the book and like I said I just read it so it’s it’s particularly it’s fresh in my mind but like.

01:03:02.70 Dave Wow Yeah, okay.

01:03:06.13 chrisgammell It is interesting just like the whole book is interesting. So I do recommend it? Um, it’s a little slow in parts and it feels like a little um, weird and but not weird. It’s like it’s a little political in parts. It’s like it’s It’s like the author is definitely bringing very strong so judgments about certain things not others. But I think honestly it’s just like.

01:03:17.11 Dave There are okay.

01:03:24.17 chrisgammell It’s very matter of fact, speaking about a lot of things and like that’s okay and like it’s not been super frustrating. So um, and like then you get stuff like this where I didn’t know in April Twenty Thirteen this stuff happened.

01:03:24.83 Dave Excellent, Yeah, it’s great. Excellent, No Wow I’m gonna to is there any done in any info on there at and on this thing out there at all.

01:03:40.81 chrisgammell Not not not in the book. But I’m sure I’m sure on the internet. There is yeah there you go Dave there’s so that’s an easy video right? there? Yeah yeah.

01:03:43.93 Dave None oh right okay oh wow oh that’s great yeah no anyway, no I’m I’m more concerned like physical attacks and stuff like that. Yeah, it’s like you know unless you had some you know nationwide thing it’s you know it’s not gonna like It’s really hard to organize like you know like a a a team of you know a hundred you know armed people to.

01:04:03.96 chrisgammell No, no, no, no oh no Dave it would take there was another thing in here. It said like we would only have to take out like 15 of these things and then because of how the grid readjusts it would actually take out a large swath of the country.

01:04:13.26 Dave Right. Yes, Oh yeah, if you knew where to hit them. Oh yeah, yeah, if you totally knew where to hit them. But but I’m saying it’s kind of difficult to get that many people organized to take down the grid right.

01:04:21.36 chrisgammell 15 yeah, it’s not that. Yeah. I see yeah hopefully people aren’t that big a dicks right? that would be I know? yeah.

01:04:34.99 Dave Yeah, exactly I mean you know like you can’t just be in a I don’t know a gang or something go Yeah, let’s just take down the entire country and I like it’s like maybe but I’m just not seeing the motive there right? not seeing the motive and the will to do it. But oh yeah, totally.

01:04:45.64 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, oh in the Moat ah people are terrible. Um, but yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:04:54.66 Dave Yeah, people are but but getting people as groups to be terrible physically like that is really difficult I think no you disagree Really you you think it would be easy.

01:05:03.67 chrisgammell I I disagree I disagree.

01:05:14.27 Dave To find 30 of your friends who yeah, let’s let’s go take let’s you know, grab our you know a r fifteen s and go and take down the grid really you think it’d be easy to find that many people right? Yeah, ah.

01:05:25.88 chrisgammell Well I don’t have 30 friends nor nor do I have any friends with a r fifteen s but um I do think there are certain groups in the us that yeah I think there I think there would be unfortunately yeah chaos. That’s what I’m really hoping is that there isn’t motive right? No i.

01:05:32.99 Dave Yeah, but what’s the motive. Yeah, exactly right? That’s a.

01:05:42.82 chrisgammell I’m just saying that if the will was there I think I think the the method is there Unfortunately I think I think it’s a big deal. You know? yeah.

01:05:45.47 Dave Oh yeah, totally okay, but anyway no I’m more concerned with the solar flare is what I’m saying basically I’m I’m more concerned with the sun burp in and we have a bad day right.

01:05:54.70 chrisgammell Oh um, yeah, this sounds burfing? Yeah yeah I mean that that is probably in terms of like ah singular events. Yeah, that would definitely be very detrimental. But I think.

01:06:07.52 Dave Yes, because because it takes it out on a global scale right? It’s just not you know County or state or nationally you know it’s like yeah okay, you’re saying what you take out 15 substations in you can take out the whole whole of the us whole the continental.

01:06:10.89 chrisgammell The more look sure. Sure sure.

01:06:20.97 chrisgammell Eastern Eastern Seaboard let’s say yeah and I’m gonna get I’m gonna get calls after this I yeah we can’t air this thing man I am I am not planning to do this personally just so we’re all clear. Do not think I’m doing this I don’t want this to happen. Please don’t don’t knock on my door.

01:06:24.21 Dave Ah, in Eastern Sea right you can take out an entire eastern seaboard. You know it’s like.

01:06:31.23 Dave Ah, ah, right.

01:06:40.86 Dave Ah, oh boy mentioned the first amendment and they’re gonna come knocking right? Okay, all right? Yep boy yeah, all right? anyway. Yeah I’m I’m more concerned with the bigger scale disruptions. Yep.

01:06:42.40 chrisgammell Ah, yeah, yeah, yeah na and and and I just yeah.

01:06:56.67 chrisgammell All the flares. Yeah yeah, anyways, this book is great. Um, other things that I learned from it um were things like like how deregulation ended up working and and like ah.

01:06:59.87 Dave Anyway, Okay, not right.

01:07:14.50 chrisgammell I didn’t I actually didn’t have a good feel for how like utilities were run back in like or really these days as well. But like you know, basically the transitions from like like traditional utilities in the Us and this is a very Us-centric book I should also say you know so this is us grid not other countries so take that with a grain of salt.

01:07:25.70 Dave Right? Of course Yeah, not yeah.

01:07:33.10 chrisgammell Um, but I didn’t realize how deregulation actually impacted things like um so like these days because of how deregulation works often like the power that I I consume will actually be like purchased.

01:07:44.99 Dave And.

01:07:49.69 chrisgammell From a plant that’s much further away. It’s not like locally generated often often. It’s like generated you know so basically like a plant or like ah you know, maybe a nuclear plant in Georgia or wherever the closest 1 is says hey we have all this excess power. We’re putting on the market at this price. My local energy company says I’d like to buy that.

01:07:55.70 Dave Right.

01:08:07.48 chrisgammell And then they say Okay, we’re going to transport this across. You know the high voltage lines all the way down the grid.

01:08:12.14 Dave Spoiler Spoiler alert. That’s why they call it the grid. Yeah, ah.

01:08:14.94 chrisgammell Yeah, but but like the the economic aspect of it I didn’t quite understand I kind of assumed that the power I’m using is the power that was generated locally but it is not not necessarily the case and yeah so I’m just learning a lot of things here. Dave I guess I should probably maybe put them into.

01:08:27.35 Dave Yeah, right right? Well, there’s a lot of people who who like when whenever I say I’ve got a solar powered car right? Yeah solar panels on my roof actually power my car and I get so many people say no, that’s bullshit.

01:08:37.67 chrisgammell Is in.

01:08:44.11 chrisgammell Um, don’t ruin.

01:08:46.49 Dave Right? It’s coming from the grid. It’s going the the actual electrons generated. They’re coming from the grid right? And and I’m going. No I’ve got a current meter current ever flows into my house or out of my house. Okay, current flows. No.

01:08:56.40 chrisgammell No yeah that’s right right it’s not 100% solar but yeah I was actually just watching I was telling you I um I was watching that video with your ah your my energy. Whatever the thing was and it was like 62

01:09:04.20 Dave No, no, it’s it’s it no, it’s a hundred percent yeah Yeah yeah, well it’s oh yeah, but no, it’s generally it’s like 99 basically a hundred right? Yeah yeah, yeah, no, it’s it’s ah it’s basically a hundred.

01:09:12.00 chrisgammell At the time you that you film that video. Yeah so like sunny days for sure right? I mean it’s yeah why Why wouldn’t it be.

01:09:21.41 Dave It’s near a hundred pounds the only time it’s not going to be is when the control when you’ve maximized your other consumption in the house as well, right? So and then and and then you’ve got the and then because there there is a control loop which has a couple of seconds actually delay before it.

01:09:28.90 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, yep, yeah you running the dryer. You’re got the air con on.

01:09:38.99 chrisgammell I see. Yeah, yeah, yep, yep.

01:09:39.14 Dave You know the car compensates. So the car adjusts its charging level based on the pwm output of the thing and you know so there’s a control loop there. But if we’ve got tons of excess solar. There’s just no, there’s no question about it I’ve got a current meter. It’s exporting to the grid. It’s not input in anything.

01:09:52.43 chrisgammell Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:09:57.32 Dave So it’s yeah I’m consuming all of that power locally. You know it’s like yeah like the a trust me a current current meter doesn’t lie right.

01:10:04.99 chrisgammell So there they they take they take umbrage with the fact that you’re you’re saying that the electrons are coming from the panels versus the grid and I get it.

01:10:13.67 Dave Yeah, they come from the yeah they come from they go no it actually comes from the grid. It’s all bullshit and it’s got no if you’ve got a literal current meter in there. Yeah I know to just just approve you. Yeah, the current meter is currents flowing out to the grid.

01:10:22.12 chrisgammell Do I have to go and unhook my grid connection to just to show you jokers that right? That’s right, This is good. That’s right right? yeah.

01:10:32.76 Dave Right? It’s like oh my God you know Anyway, man people just don’t get it. No yeah, shockarra. Yeah, by the way you are gonna lose your bet. Yeah, totally dude.

01:10:40.10 chrisgammell It’s almost like peep on the internet are antagonistic for no reason is sometimes.

01:10:47.24 chrisgammell You think? yeah yeah I mean maybe you know what I will be funding the first round of Dave gadgets running risk 5 processors. So if I lose I lose.

01:10:51.89 Dave Yeah, yep. all right all right all right I may substitute in the three cent micro. Okay so hundred bucks worth of ¢3 micros gets me a lot of micros. Yeah.

01:11:05.91 chrisgammell Oh yeah, okay, yeah, we’ll just put it at a hundred bucks hundred bucks to put towards your chips of choice. Yeah, sure great. We’ll see we’ll see how it goes. We’ll see how it goes in the meantime you could find me at chaos social I cross post to Twitter.

01:11:15.64 Dave Excellent, All right done.

01:11:25.47 chrisgammell But I’m not on there any any ah any any days.

01:11:26.14 Dave Yeah, oh yes, you should make the announcement that your tweets your you still do cross post to Twitter but you don’t read anything there anymore right right? right so if people actually reply to you on Twitter you won’t see it right.

01:11:36.25 chrisgammell That’s right? Yep yep.

01:11:41.93 chrisgammell That’s right, you can call me whatever you whatever name? you’d like also known as Twitter yeah I’m just saying it’s always been like and on Twitter yeahp yep cool.

01:11:48.57 Dave Luddite anyway, you can you certainly contact me on Twitter on there all day every day. Yep, now there right.

01:11:59.21 chrisgammell Right? Well thank you once again, we should once again, thank our our unknowing patron of our subreddit unmanaged six fifteen regularly posting lots and lots of links on there just a legend. So thanks for that and yeah, we’ll.

01:12:08.38 Dave Yes, I noticed that yep and all our patrons of course who keep the show Afloat Yep, that’s it. We’re done.

01:12:18.23 chrisgammell We’ll be back of course of course. Yeah, yep, yep. All right Cool. We’ll see you next time.

01:12:26.69 Dave Catch you next time.

Welcome Joshua Vasquez of The Allen Institute and the Jubilee Project and Zach Fredin of Commonwealth Fusion Systems!

• Background
  • This is a special show because I (Chris) found a 2019 recording during Teardown (other shows were released from that event). Somehow the show with Joshua and Zach was never published, I think because I found it on my recorder much later.
  • The 2019 show (starting at 1:31:00 on the recording) was when Joshua had been in grad school at the University of Washington for 1 year and Zach was getting ready to go to grad school at MIT at the Center for Bits and Atoms (CBA). Both were intending to get their PhD.
  • I caught up with Joshua and Zach at the 2022 Hackaday Superconference in early November (discussed on 610) and learned that they had both left their PhD program with a Master's Degree and now were back in industry, working at some very cool new jobs.
  • I thought it would be an interesting experiment to record with them again in 2022 and get their perspectives on grad school...but I didn't let them hear the 2019 show first.
• The Jubilee Project is a toolchanger on a CNC machine / gantry.
• Zach had been on the show before for Neurotinker
• Zach worked on Reconfigurable computation systems
• NMR
• Joshua joined University of Washington to work with past guest Nadya Peek
• "Fabricatability"
• Kinematic coupling, which is a method of exact constraint
• It's like "Free body diagrams but in reverse"
• Bal-tec precision balls
• Joshua contacted a seller on alibaba and has an 8 mm ball with M3 threaded hole made for other people wanting to build a Jubilee
• Hackaday vocabulary of parts
• Misumi
• Jubilee project long term? Still going, some people building the project still. Filistruder makes a kit based on it.
• Jubilee Discord community
• The community is working on some specialized heads, like a sonicator head
• Zach was working on nuclear magnetic resonance, trying to make containers that could withstand 7 million rpm / 112 kHz.
• Using the machine they were able to get the molecular spectrum (like mass spectrometry) of things like brain plaque for Alzheimers research.
• PI = Principal Investigator
• Work is continuing on the microadjusters and making diamond tubes
• What are the downsides of grad school?
  • Getting to work on the things you want to work on
  • Balancing Research and Development
• Prior to grad school, Joshua was at a synthetic biology company. He was "the human who would write software for hardware" and building machines for their manufacturing capabilities.
• E3D toolchanger
• Was drudgery part of the process?
• Zach gives cautionary advice for grad students: "Early on you need to learn how to evaluate rabbit holes" (note this advice when listening to the 2019 section)
• Tidal forces
• How to make almost anything
• Joshua says that in grad school, "the projecting part of you becomes weaponized. [It was] was near and dear to who I was"
• A lot of work before grad school was trade secret
• Joshua's current work is open source, which is an unexpected benefit.
• He works at the Allen institute (named for Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen), in the recently formed "Institute for Neural Dynamics".
• They are imaging mouse brains to understand what are the ingredients inside the brain.
• They already know a lot of the genes in neurons, but now they're finding out where those genes are expressed.
• The project he's working on is like a "reverse SLA printer".
• It's a rolling shutter camera with a laser sheet slicing across a mouse brain that is "transparent" (with some bio chemical voodoo)
• 1 mouse brain = 100 TB of data
• Zach is now working on Commonwealth Fusion Systems, a 400 person startup for fusion energy.
• They are busy trying to get deuterium and tritium to fuse
• ITER is a long running fusion project in France, built using the magnetics available at the time.
• CFS is using higher temp superconductors, which represent better magnetics. Magnetics and plasma containment are one of the key constraints for "power in vs power out"
• Zach does instrumentation for the machine as a "Tokamak Instrumentation Engineer"
• The platform CFS hopes to commercialize is called "ARC"
• Zach is getting back to making by joining the recently relaunced Artisans Asylum
• Joshua felt bona fides (masters degree from UW) helped in the interview for his current job (which he found out about at the Seattle Hardware Happy Hour!), but he didn't need to have the knowledege gained at grad school to understand the work.
• The 2019 portion of in the show starts around 1:31:00

• Windell's background is in physics, he worked on some very sensitive experiments at NIST. He has been running Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories (EMSL) with Lenore since 2006.
• Eric has worked at large software and semiconductor companies throughout the bay area.
• Eric and Windell started collaborating together on the "three fives kit", which allows people to build their own 555 timer out of discrete components.
• The first prototype was breadboard that is still in the EMSL library.
• The 555 Footstool
• They went on to collaborate on the 741 discrete op amp kit, which comes in through hole and surface mount.
• Eric made a fake datasheet on an ideal op amp
• The MOnSter6502 was a discrete version of the MOS 6502. It had additional LEDs that showed the state.
• Chris was thinking about it when he saw the Hackaday Supercon 2022 badge.
• The meetup after Bay Area Maker Faire was where it was conceived when Bunnie (past guest) asked what the largest discrete version of a part could be. The meetup was also the basis for Hackaday Superconference ("what if we could make that meetup be the entire weekend?")
• The creator of the 6502, Chuck Peddle, was on the show back in 2015
• Open Circuits is a book they have been working on for a few years together that was recently released.
• Focused on components, not devices
• Chris just finished Kathy Joseph's book The Lightning Tamers and was amazed at the comparison of modern electronics with how things started in the field of electronics.
• Natural vs synthetic materials
• The Way Things Work (McCaulay) was another formative "coffee table" book, albeit with more Mastadons on the cover. The book Eric was trying to remember was ... also called The Way Things Work
• Why not use CTs?
  • Loses texture and color
  • Flattens the image
• What are the slogs of writing a book?
  • The time process
  • Took 9 months to get inital material
  • Took another 9 months for editing and getting things right (explaining to a wide audience)
• No Starch Press provided a great editor.
• Describing complex topics like "multiplexing" is tricky to a wide audience.
• "Up Goer Five" (XKCD) is an example of simple language trying to explain complex topics.
• Windell works on the AxiDraw on a daily basis, which is a pen plotter (and associated software)
• #PlotterTwitter is a hashtag on Twitter to follow digital artists
• TubeTime is Eric's experiments on Vintage computing. He also does long tweet threads on many of his projects.
• He's currently making a replica Apple I computer
• There is a large community; AppleFritter is a site that documents a lot of idiosyncrasies of the original computer
• Many early computers has async logic to cut down on required circuits. HDL solves clocking for you.
• Eric troubleshoots using a Saleae Logic Pro 16
• Stringy floppy
• How to preserve data in an era of "using other peoples' computers" (Cloud). The Internet Archive maintains a lot of data.
• Twitter is hopefully not shutting down anytime soon, but :shrug:.
• Get your copy of the Open Circuits Book at any of the vendors listed on the book website.
• Evil Mad Scientist has signed copies! (be sure to click "yes")
• Find Windell online at evilmadscientist.com
• Find Eric on Twitter at @tubetimeus, his website tubetime.us, and (if needed) tubetime@mastadon.social

• PCB Arts has been developing the EdgeKit, a modular platform for AI and vision applications baesd on the nVidia Jetson
• Saber and team were building robots previously, up through 2017
• After they encountered software people not understanding hardware, they decided to focus on nvidia jetson
• They focus mostly on smaller companies
• Example application is an inspection tunnel in auto manufacturing
• Use nVidia resources to rebuild camera modules in the kernel
• They have 6 people on the team and do consulting services in additoin to the products they build
• 3 month timelines for projects
• They have been focusing on reinvesting in the business and investing in product development
• Buying parts 1.5 years ago
• Complexity of the product determines the percentage of the overall process the design piece is (vs manufacturing / certs / sales)
• The Vapor Phase One is a prosumer level Vapor Phase reflow machine
• Chris first encountered Vapor Phase when Jonathan Hirschman of PCB:ng was on the show.
• Compared to infrared ovens, Vapor Phase doesn't have to worry about scorching or shading components.
• Normally they are 10K+ euros for oven
• Safety wise, it's safe as long as the liquid is heated precisely
• The Vapor Phase One is available in their web store
• Also available on Mouser for US people (as are most Crowd Supply campaign products). There are 4 distributors in Europe.
• It was a hassle to get the product certified in the US
• They targeted a $1500 price, ended up at $5k (still half of most Vapor Phase)
• The liquid inside the machine is called Galden, which stays at a stable vapor temperature when heated.
• 1kg lasts 1 year or more.
• After a bit of time, you need to clean the flux out of the Galden resevoir.
• There is a post cleaning process based on water cooling built in the system. At 120C, the PCB will come out "dry".
• PCB Arts has posted on Twitter/their blog about visualizing boards in Blender.
• They are focused on software improvements for the Vapor Phase machine.
• Since PCB Arts is based in Nuremberg, they will again be at Embedded World
• Follow the company and Saber at PCB Arts on their site.
• Follow Saber on LinkedIn