The Amp Hour

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**The Amp Hour**

The Amp Hour is a weekly conversation about electronics and the people who design them.

Latest Episodes:

Lunar Eclipse — **The Hard Work Hypothesis** Dec 22, 2010
Show notes

We wanted to try out a title similar to the style of The Big Bang Theory…we love it!

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Shoutout

Another Ham-like video podcast called Amateur Logic. We like it! Thanks to the queen of science videos (Jeri) for the link!

Dave got scooped! Afrotechmods did an AWESOME video about ultracaps. He arc welded a coin!

http://www.youtube.com/v/EoWMF3VkI6U

ShoutDown

Even though it's Chris' favorite news source, NPR recently used Dave's Kindle teardown video without attribution! Booo.

WotW

Frank from (cold!) Finland

View 1 of the bench

View 2 of the bench (-1 point for not being in the shot!)

Nathan from ASoberNewt (website, not a place)

The bench by itself

And Nathan in the shot while in the garage

Follow Up

More about last week's discussion about PhD's: they only make 3% more on average than those with a Master's, according to a recent article from The Economist. Monetarily, PhD's don't seem worth it (though they may be otherwise)

Discussion Points

Is there a competitive advantage to being a squeaky wheel? Dave's new videos got good responses from DigiKey and Maxim.

Matt from the Antipasto Hardware Blog talks at length about the need for continued innovation in the Open Source Hardware Community.

In the US, they are opening up the FM bands for the first time to non-commercial enterprises. Can Dave and Chris buy their way onto the airwaves? ;-)

There is also more talk about the Nearfield Communication capabilities of cellphones in the near future, as led by Google. There's an open standard, but how much will be accessible to the user/hacker/maker?

More tech executive foolishness. Some were caught "consulting" while holding a high ranking position in a company. What a bunch of dopes!

Dave doesn't want to work anymore. He would much rather retire now and do electronics as a hobby, who's in?

An early submission from @wa7iut:

**More Freeagle, More Benches and More Engineers on Twitter** Dec 15, 2010
Show notes

[display_podcast]

Seasonal

What is on your electronics list for the holidays? Dave and Chris both need new chairs for their labs

WOTW

Henrik from Oslo, Norway

Bench setup and explanation.

Sylvain from Belgium

Bench setup for RF projects.

David from Portland

Portable bench setup. Taking your electronics on the road is impressive!

Mike from the UK (mikeselectricstuff)

MASSIVE panorama of his amazing lab. Breathtaking how well he uses the space and how much he crams in there!

Shoutouts

IEEE has a podcast. Not the easiest thing to find but there are a lot of different topics and interviews!

Discussion Points

Are squishy circuits the beginning of the circuit printing we've been talking about? Too soon in the technology to tell.

Listener Harry tells us about The Woz being on "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me"

The Freagle Campaign is still going. While we appreciate the Cad Soft team getting on Twitter, we still think the revenue generated from EAGLE BOM pushes will offset costs. And if not, RS Design Spark is free!

EAGLE also just added a script for getting a PCB quote, apparently. No word who the vendor is but Dave thinks this will extend far beyond PCBs into entire supply chains.

Fluke could use a little work on their Tweeting. Not all engineers care about American football!

It seems the foundries may be buying into opening up their standards to the EDA vendors. Could this mean more open source tools (like Electric) or will it just open it among the big players?

Dave and Chris get asked to fix peoples' stuff because we're engineers, but Chris much more often gets asked to be IT. Google has a new site to help with that.

What's the payoff from getting a PhD? Is it even worth it for all the effort required?

Inventables, an awesome site with small quantity, weird new materials for use in hobby projects.

Dave's Lab:
A video tour of Dave’s EEVblog lab:

http://www.youtube.com/v/LXIoZBCr3Xk

This is the “Summer Oasis” that Dave’s wife made him build her. Dave thinks it’s a waste of space and it should have been used for a big shed!" (yes, that tiny tool shed is behind the opening fence. Before and after shots:

Military Electronics and The Free Eagle (Freagle) Campaign Dec 07, 2010

Show notes

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Our first WOTWs!
- Mike, who works at Ascot TV in Christchurch New Zealand! More info about Mike's is here.
  - Dave likes the Bob Parker ESR meter.
- David work at Delta-Q Technologies in Vancouver, Canada. More info about David is here (as are many more pictures!).
  - David plans on doing something similar to the Electric Delorean project
Follow-up
- Mario, a reader/listener on Linked In, wrote to let us know about the existence of cross reference sheets for transistors that are still readily available (the sheets, not the transistors).
- Frank wrote in the comments of Episode 19 about a different user interface device called "I-love-sketch" from the University of Toronto. Looks like a cool stylus based way of interacting with your designs.
- Dave mentioned the video of Scott Adams drawing Dilbert using a similar type of vector based system.
- Chris's additional argument for making your own chips...no more obsolescence unless YOU decide you don't want to make it anymore, inspired by companies playing on our emotions i.e. Zilog canceling popular parts back in the day and now IXYS bringing them back. Dave recons it's a straw man argument!
- RS DesignSpark contacted us and told us they will be fixing their FAQ section. Hopefully it's soon!
  - On a separate note, since RS and Element14 seem to trade blows, perhaps E14 should think about making Eagle completely free? (Freagle? - Free Eagle). Dave & Chris start the Free Eagle campaign!
Discussion Points
- Engineers in the military-industrial complex. How do you decide whether or not to participate? What about developing weapons with algorithms designed to remove any places left to hide?
  - There's no right or wrong answers, just personal choices. Do you work for one? Please let us know below, we're very curious.
- Badass (military?) hackers are an army unto themselves, they took down the Iranian centrifuges for months!
- Is Jones' Diminishing Blog Law already named? Or does Dave need to just update that wiki page?
- Right in time for all our WOTW stuff, @UptownGreen posted a list of essentials for the lab you might not have thought of.
- And while a crowbar is not on the list, Chris keeps one around his lab for a heatsink...
- Hi-Res stuff is expensive difficult! We're impressed by Jeri's new TSA hack but Chris realized how much he expects Hi-res for images. Same for a new project using an Arduino for an IR camera.
Rant
- Rambus is going after big chip makers for patents. And worse, now they're sinking their teeth into LED patents! Chris is still pissed at them for closing off RDRAM in his Dell Dimension 8100...

That's all for now. Please submit your (audio or text) questions/suggestions at the suggestions page and your pictures at the WOTW tab if you're interested in being featured!

Chris_Gammell_In_The_Lab_1 — **CAD programs, Systems Design and Renewable Energy** Nov 30, 2010
Show notes

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Shout-outs

Rich Hoeg of The Northstar Nerd, linked to us from his podcast page! Be sure to check out the others on there!

To Google Sketchup! For offering electro-nerds the opportunity to do 3D modeling (easily!). They have a new contest in conjunction with Ponoko (thanks to @dustynrobots for the link). Check it out if interested in winning free software and stuff.Shoutouts

Dave has used eMachineShop

Rants

An applications engineering job working with Labview requires a PhD?

IEEE Salary Service isn't included with membership fees?? What am I paying for? How are they any better than an eBook company??

CadSoft EAGLE needs a new pricing structure. Perhaps @element14 could take a look at it and make more sense of it? Why not charge by the layer instead of the geography??

Discussion Point

A second edition of the NPR story on Hackerspaces played over the weekend. Mentions how MakerBot started out of NYCresistor (and the BotCave!)

In an age of increasing hardware abstraction, is it better to be a generalist or a specialist?

Jeri has a new video up about her (TSA Body Scanner) backscatter project. Trying to make a Hot Wheels radar gun into a 10 GHz local oscillator. This video is the first in the series and explains the background of radar.

Dave & Chris butt heads over whether or not it will be possible to make your own practical chips at home in the future. Dave calls bullshit, Chris calls why not dude.

New gesture software for the TI MSP430 Chronos watch. Cool idea!

Medical devices are capable of very small form factors, such as this wand/iPhone combo for ultrasound.

Renewable energy investment is politically/militarily driven in Isreal. Planning $500 million in investment in the next few years...wean everyone off oil and some of their adversaries have less money!

Dave likes the plan in Australia to be 100% renewable by 2020.

The molten salt method of storing energy could really help.

We're still looking for submissions for Workplace (and now Workbench) of the week. If you don't, we'll keep posting pictures of Chris in silly hats in my lab. Please email or leave a comment on the WOTW page!
*Chris and his recently re-setup lab*
Thanks for listening! And let us know what you think of the music (don't worry, Chris can take it!)

Dave in the EEVblog Lab — **CAD programs, Systems Design and Renewable Energy** Nov 30, 2010
Show notes

[display_podcast]

Shout-outs

Rich Hoeg of The Northstar Nerd, linked to us from his podcast page! Be sure to check out the others on there!

To Google Sketchup! For offering electro-nerds the opportunity to do 3D modeling (easily!). They have a new contest in conjunction with Ponoko (thanks to @dustynrobots for the link). Check it out if interested in winning free software and stuff.Shoutouts

Dave has used eMachineShop

Rants

An applications engineering job working with Labview requires a PhD?

IEEE Salary Service isn't included with membership fees?? What am I paying for? How are they any better than an eBook company??

CadSoft EAGLE needs a new pricing structure. Perhaps @element14 could take a look at it and make more sense of it? Why not charge by the layer instead of the geography??

Discussion Point

A second edition of the NPR story on Hackerspaces played over the weekend. Mentions how MakerBot started out of NYCresistor (and the BotCave!)

In an age of increasing hardware abstraction, is it better to be a generalist or a specialist?

Jeri has a new video up about her (TSA Body Scanner) backscatter project. Trying to make a Hot Wheels radar gun into a 10 GHz local oscillator. This video is the first in the series and explains the background of radar.

Dave & Chris butt heads over whether or not it will be possible to make your own practical chips at home in the future. Dave calls bullshit, Chris calls why not dude.

New gesture software for the TI MSP430 Chronos watch. Cool idea!

Medical devices are capable of very small form factors, such as this wand/iPhone combo for ultrasound.

Renewable energy investment is politically/militarily driven in Isreal. Planning $500 million in investment in the next few years...wean everyone off oil and some of their adversaries have less money!

Dave likes the plan in Australia to be 100% renewable by 2020.

The molten salt method of storing energy could really help.

We're still looking for submissions for Workplace (and now Workbench) of the week. If you don't, we'll keep posting pictures of Chris in silly hats in my lab. Please email or leave a comment on the WOTW page!
*Chris and his recently re-setup lab*
Thanks for listening! And let us know what you think of the music (don't worry, Chris can take it!)

Transistor Types and Where To Get Electronic Gear Nov 23, 2010

Show notes

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Shoutouts
- Dave's $50 shootout is cited in Adafruit now carrying the Extech meter. Cool! There's also mention of it on extech site.
- NPR did a piece covering hackerspaces. Likely many have heard about it , but it's good coverage of the burgeoning trend.
- All About Circuits is a great resource if you've never seen it. Huge forum, great open textbook.
Discussion Points
- Is it feasible to open a fab that only makes discontinued chips. Places like Rochester Electronics and Lansdale both do it, but at very high cost.
- Dave says there are still stores in Australia that sell electronics like Jaycar and Altronics. Chris doesn't know of any in Ohio. Jaycar even sponsor a big Rugby League Football team
- However, Freetronix posted to their Twitter that they will get their gear into some shops, it's likely the ones listed above. Congrats!
Where to buy stuff online? If there are no more storefront eShops, where to go?
- Elexp, as suggested by LadyAda
- Electronics Goldmine
- Futurlec
- Electronics Surplus (in Cleveland)
- BG Micro
- Alltronics
- Many thanks to Sam of Maker's Alliance in Cleveland! Great suggestions!
An EEVBlog user got a super nice Tek scope off Craigslist. Should he sell it, buy a cheaper one and profit?
Different parts of the world have standard NPN/PNP parts (as well as other types of parts).
- North America is the 2N3904/2N3906
- Europe and Australia is the BC547/BC548
- Japan is 2SC1815
- Thanks to Wikipedia for the info about transistors (don't forget to donate while you're there!)
Chris has found the value of plotting realistic timelines in his projects and also trying to figure out the all important "requirements" for the project, one of Jack Ganssle's favorite topics in his writing.
Dave continues to work on his secret project but might trot out the demo soon.

New Segment: Workplace of the Week!
- We'll have a dedicated page to workplace of the week where we keep track of people that write to us.
- Send in your pictures, what kind of work you do and anything else you'd like to tell us about your work place. The stranger the better!
- This week was inadvertently The Riverside Robotics Class from Chattaroy Washington!
  - They had written to Dave previously and became the first chosen. We'll post pictures later if we get any from them. They are a HS electronics club that works on robotics! Awesome to see HS students working with electronics.
- Interested in being the next workplace of the week? Let us know!

Thanks for listening!

EE Movies, Part Rants and SPICE. Nov 16, 2010

Show notes

[display_podcast] Links!

Shoutouts
- Solder Smoke is back! Bill is out in the HAM shack, broadcasting podcasts for all. Go catch the latest one!
- A podcast about DIY Drones, check it out and hear the most about the developing industry of unmanned personal drones!
Rants
- Chris loves the Webench tool from National Semiconductor...he just wishes there was a "prototype option".
- Dave was right, and not a bit afraid to tell everyone. Open Source Hardware (not just "Open Hardware") is the correct terminology...it's on the license!
- Why can't Amazon pay people globally? It's preventing Dave from retiring sooner! And if you live in Colorado, North Carolina or Rhode Island you are screwed.
Discussion Points
- What do you say? .001uF or 1nF? Not getting into another 555 timer debate, but still it's interesting.
- How much time should be put into simulating in SPICE?
- Apparently Oman needs electrical engineers that can speak Mandarin. Guess China is doing some work there?
- Free energy schemes are only free to those that run them, don't get fooled (no link, they don't deserve the press).
- Lots of component talk around Dave's video about designing for manufacturability.
- Jeff from Mighty Ohm found that if you call the IEEE, they'll stop sending worthless insurance offers and junk mail.
- There's a new movie about an electrical engineer to be done by the guy that directed "The Blind Side".
- The story of how Nathan Seidle got started with Spark Fun. A great read and similar to the Apple guys and how they bootstrapped their first products.

LED Designs, Last Minute Designs and Board Designs Nov 09, 2010

Show notes

After an admittedly non-technical episode last week, we had an abundance of tech topics this week. So why keep writing when we can get to the links and you can get to listening! [display_podcast]

Shoutouts
- Troy Rank has a new show about e-bikes. Looking forward to hearing about the electronics in them!
- The 555 timer is 40 years old! Talk about a solid design. Potential replacements can't touch all the sales the original still gets.
- Google asks about the DEADBEEF register in interviews. Chris is glad they focus a little on memory knowledge (not just the abstract CS type stuff). Dave had no idea what DEADBEEF was, and likes CAFEBABE much better!
Discussion Points
- - Dave and Chris are both working on LED projects. Dave's is an RGB module for a tradeshow and looks great!
- - Dave pointed out an useful app note from Agilent/Avago.
about driving LED matrix displays.
- The talk about hardware design from Amanda Wozniak (W0z) was called "crass" by some, but Dave and Chris love the tech content...so who cares?
- New design contest from Hackaday, Adafruit and MAKE: Buy, Break, Build (using a Dancing Santa for parts)
Rants
- Why are software development packages so HUGE? (No link, just feel free to go to any chip maker and download their development package).
Updates
- Karl von Moller is continuing work on his documentary about the Australian electronics industry and it will now be in a 3 part series! We're looking forward to it.

Anything we missed? Are you a manager that wants to let us know (anonymously or otherwise) about the fact that your a manager AND you listen to the Amp Hour? Let us hear you in the comments!

Analog Components, First Person Flying and Idea Ownership Nov 02, 2010

Show notes

Not as many links this week but the usual hour’s worth of talking. We even managed to work in a comment or two about open hareware development (even though we promised not to previously). On to the links!

[display_podcast]

Shoutouts
- - There's a documentary about hacker/maker spaces that needs your help! Help fund it at Kickstarter!
  - Dave's video from Apex Electronics is up now. Awesome views of piles of electronic junk.
Followup
- There is free software to develop chip level designs!
- Chris Atkins suggests his former professor's site for tutorials and other links.
- Fluxor talks about potential ways to get the cost of wafers down.
Discussion Points
- The "Poken" Dave took apart from the Renesas event used a Microchip part - Oops!
- 1st person view flying from a tri-copter. Chris wishes he would have had this at the Rally to Restore Sanity to see over the crowds.
- One listener is disappointed with Instructables working through paid memberships. Dave is annoyed he can't download source code without joining, and gives Instructables the big thumbs down. Are they the leeches of the open source community?
- Element14 is offering to send people to conferences on their dime if you report and cover it on video.

Sorry about the blip in the audio, I should have been better prepared. We'll get another try next week though! Until then!

China, Entrepreneurs and Blue Collar Reality Oct 27, 2010

Show notes

Dave made it home safe and sound! We’re glad to have him back and appreciate Jeff from MightyOhm stepping up to the plate in his absence. This week we jumped right past the videos Dave plans on posting and into talking about current events, so why don’t we do the same with the links?

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Shoutouts!
- Thanks for the mention from Jack Ganssle, rock star of the embedded world for mentioning The Amp Hour in his column. And he mentions Jeri's awesome garage experimenting as well!
- In terms of larger custom designs, we like Jeff's idea of using MOSIS for chip development.
- We were added to the Podcast Bunker. Thanks!
- Dean Kamen, famed inventor of the Segway, has a new show called "The Dean of Invention" on the Discovery Channel. The first episode about biometrics is available for free online.
Discussion Points
- - Sky high! A video on fixing an RF control tower! Awesome!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDNGZVmhkTo
- Speaking of dangerous, a 500 kV rock sorter that blows rocks apart with high voltage (thanks to reddit for the link mention)
- Blue collar vs. White collar. Mike Rowe (of the Discovery Channel show, Dirty Jobs) discusses why the former is important for a strong middle class.
- Also important is the role of entrepreneurs. Chris went to a seminar last night with Dr. Thomas Zurbuchen of the University of Michigan's Center for Entrepreneurship. While Dave and Chris were slightly skeptical about the "teaching" of building businesses, from what we hear it sounds like they are doing it right: namely the "doing".
- Speaking of entrepreneurs, Dave noticed the "EcoSwitch" is finally available. It's a cautionary tale about staying away from companies that claim to want to help you design your invention.
Rants
- Dave doesn't like that it's "Open Hardware" instead of "Open Source Hardware", mostly that he's corrected about it. Who cares about the name?
- China / US tensions building. Bills introduced in US gov't, China cutting off rare earth supplies. Could get messy, but hopefully it's just dumb politicians rattling the saber.

It was good to have Dave back and us making fun of one another from different continents. Something about that just seems right. Do you have something to make fun of us about? Did we miss or mess something up? Let us know in the comments!

Chips And Fabs And Garages Oct 22, 2010

Show notes

Holy YouTube clips, Batman! We have tons of clips this week. Chris and our special guest Jeff Keyzer were talking about lots of stuff and it turns out many of them were video based. We can’t wait to see many of Dave’s videos, he’s still traveling around and is still working on editing and uploading many of them. On to the links!

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Shoutouts
- Chiphacker.com has become Electronics Stack Exchange. It's a really awesome format and a great community so far!
Discussion Points
- - - What would it take to make open hardware chips?
    - Jeri Ellsworth has done it! In her garage no less!
  http://www.youtube.com/v/w_znRopGtbE
  - One of our listeners Richard thinks it could be done with laser printers.
  - Chip fabs are better places to do that, just like the one Jeff visited (well, not during the taping of this music video):
http://www.youtube.com/v/hMOkfI7wCrI
- - Fabs use some nasty chemicals (and some that aren't allowed under ROHS) like SF6. But SF6 is fun too!
http://www.youtube.com/v/vcVMjGRzDz8
http://www.youtube.com/v/1PJTq2xQiQ0
- Jeff has used the services of James (@laen) who has a great PCB bundling service.
Rants
- No parts? Still? AVRs are hard to find and it hurts small businesses!
- Dumb analysts are sad FPGA lead times are getting better.
- Chris hates it when there aren't standard pinouts!