devices of unecessary complexity

I can't imagine how difficult that was before the software design packages became available.

I'll no doubt look for that from now on.

TTL? Old style. GHz fast TTL? Is that possible?

Reliefs are neat for those of us who are semi-ham-handed. (Act II popcorn PCB noted ;)

And that's exactly what they wanted, I'm sure.

Holy Shit, Batman! Dat's hi-tech schtuff.

That was a learning moment.

The deeper you delve into most anything, the more that happens. Constants aren't. Temperature, humidity, sound, & light can affect lots of things in strange ways, as you just recalled.

All true. But they're no *fun*.

rangerssuck fired this volley in news: snipped-for-privacy@googlegroups.com:

No, but it gets the chip located well, because you can keep all the pins liquid at once. After it solidifies, then you can selectively wick off the Chip-Quick, and re-flow with the correct solder while not disturbing the chip position. A little liquid flux helps there.

Lloyd

Mike Spencer fired this volley in news: snipped-for-privacy@bogus.nodomain.nowhere:

I don't know if the fun was in the fixing. I'd pit my Mitsubishi Galant against my old Gymkana cars of the 60's any day, and win by half a circuit. It's a pretty fun car to drive, if you can horse it around a little.

There's still 'fun' to be had in tricking them out, if that's what you're into.

Lloyd

I thought CAD software slowed me down because I could see the whole board at 2x or 4x magnification on the light table, but only a small window on the screen, and I could use both hands to apply the tape strips. The snap-to grid in CAD was a little easier to stay on and much easier to change than the printed grid sheet on the light table.

You plan out the path of each connection separately, the same way you'd plan a trip on a map. The difference is that you run each new trace alongside the previous ones so you don't quickly clog the remaining free space, and move vertically on one side and horizontally on the other. On a 386 computer a good designer could hand-route almost as fast as the autorouter, like man vs machine chess. The program advanced incrementally, tried every dead end, and couldn't step away for a global overview.

I complained of eye strain to get my boss to buy a $2000 20" long-persistance (no flicker) CAD monitor, which helped a lot because I could see both ends of the trace I was hand-routing to minimize the number of inductive corners and unwanted coupling to other signals. I still had to avoid red which the eye focuses at a different distance from other colors.

74AS hi-to-lo transitions are fast enough to excite GigaHertz resonances. Another department brought me a board to troubleshoot with a problem that had eluded them. I found that they had used low-speed analog design rules to make a star-pattern ground plane and where 74AS signals crossed from one lobe of it to another the ground bounce during a hi-to-lo bus transition was over 3V, because the signal's return reflection in the plane couldn't make it out to the single-point plane junction and back along the other side in a nanoSecond.

Being bested by a lab tech doesn't do a Ph.D's self-image any good. I had to present the evidence very clearly on a scope display, which usually took longer than finding the problem, and be as diplomatic as possible, letting them see the evidence and make their own judgement.

It was surprising how much trouble some of them had with mental math, like converting the time between pulses to frequency. Quick, what's the frequency for a 60 nanoSecond period?

Many discrete components' properties look terrible when you sweep them with a microwave network analyzer. This shows the deviation of a chip cap in an SMT package that's larger than necessary for its value.

When the company was bought the competitors sued that it was "unfair" that the biggest company in the ATE field had acquired the small one they acknowledged to be the best. The cost of fighting that suit destroyed us.

Engineers don't learn those strange ways unless they encounter them in practice. I did a job for a well-respected mechanical engineering prof who devised an overly complex way to assemble a robot chassis because he had never heard of Pemnuts.

-jsw

I've driven a lot of both new and old cars - and there is more "fun" per lb on a lot of today's cars than on the old ones. A WHOLE lot more power, and less weight - as well as suspensions that actually HANDLE.

Handling is better. Power is greater. But weight is grotesquely higher.

A 1965 Mustang had a curb weight of about 2,700 lb. A 2014 Mustang has a curb weight over 3,500 lb, with the smallest V6 engine. And so on.

I don't knock the current crop of cars -- they're great pieces of engineering, and so many of the old bugs have been engineered out that you can drive much faster, with greater safety and control.

But fun? I don't know about that. My smaller sports cars from the '50s and '60s were so light and so responsive that I have to give them the edge for driving fun. Even my AC Aceca, which had exactly the same chassis as an AC Cobra, and which was twitchy as hell at high speeds, was fantastically responsive.

So I guess it's a matter of what's fun to you. I drove a nice new Japanese coupe this summer, with lowered suspension, active anti-understeer, and other trick items, and I couldn't believe how well it handled. But you can't hide all of that adipose tissue. It was like a greased pig, but it still felt piggy.

What did a 1949 6 cyl chevy weigh??? A 4 door sedan weighed 3150 lms dry. What does a 2014 Impala weigh??? 3800 lbs wet - so yes, a bit heavier - with AC and automatic transmission that were not on the '49

And a '72 v8 coupe weighed in at 3025

OK - so they are heavier, but I find them much more resposive and they hold the road much better. A 1972 Rover 2000TC handled like it was on rails and rode not half bad, but a 1995 Mystique would run it's wheels off and outhandle it in the twisties. 500 miles a day in a '53 Dodge was a workout. In a 2003 Taurus, even being 40 years older than I was when driving the '53, I get out relaxed after 800 miles. And it rides better, handles better, is quieter, is easier on gas, and needs a WHOLE lot less repairs. Was my old mini fun? Sure was. And a lot lighter than today's mini - but it wasn't fun after the first 200 miles per day!!!!

They corner faster, no question. Much better suspension, but above all

-- and above all by a *lot* -- is wider, much better tires.

I've driven that car. It had a wonderfully stiff chassis, which was the cornerstone of its handling.

Well, you're introducing a lot of different issues here. The original Mini was so small and light it was almost like driving a Go-Cart. When they were stiffened up for solo events, they felt almost like a little formula car.

I haven't driven today's Mini but I own a car that's not a lot different (Ford Focus ZX3 hatchback, 2.3L, 2,600 lb curb weight), and it's a nice handling little car. But in no way does it feel like the original Mini. Or like my '67 MG Midget. Nor my '58 Alfa Romeo Guilietta Spyder.

Those cars were so light (in the neighborhood of 1,500 lb.) and small that they had a catagorically different feel to them. I still love that feeling, as rarely as I get to experience it these days. And, besides, what's a sports car without the smell of mold emanating from the floor mats?

I would not consider owning one as an everyday driver. I do appreciate how much better cars are today. But I go back to that original statement, about fun. They were more fun, in the terms that cars are fun for me.

Except for sex. Having sex in an MG Midget was pretty awful. d8-)

I wasn't speaking incrementally, rather about the difference between doing it by hand then, and doing it now with sophisticated software. (Yeah, I know, you had to take the long, hard route. Condolences.)

I toyed with the freebie downloads of autorouters for the low-level stuff, just for fun. A decade later, both software and hardware were multi-generations better, faster, and smarter.

Remember the yelonblu screens way back when? Ayieeeeeeeeeeeee! Nice monitors are great. While you played with CAD, I was buying better than average (but nowhere your grade) monitors for graphic design work. A friend had an old Multilith 1250 press and I'd print out 8.5x14" polyester plates (4-color seps) with my HP LJ5p laserjet. That was low-tech fun. Once I got a better monitor, I could see the problems beforehand and avoid printing them. Resolution is God.

Hah! That's a helluva bounce, a bit more than a couple pf could handle, wot? (But how do you damp the ground plane?)

Oh, joy! Diplomatic Dog & Pony Shows suck.

"I don't need to know that. Ask my secretary."

Suckage. More often than not, lawsuits destroy everything they touch. Ban Lawyers!

Indeed. Too many of those uberProfs never get into the trenches at all, missing 2/3 of knowledge in their field by default. The result is that I seldom trust anyone with anything over a Master's. Too often, it _is_ Piled Higher and Deeper.

Oh, SURE they are! I can take the winding road into town at 65mph in the rain with one hand now in my '07 Tundra. I could hardly keep the road at 45mph in the old '90 F-150. EFI has stopped all the old hesitations in the morning that I had with carbureted vehicles. Granted, if I were still wrenching for a living, I'd have lots less to do nowadays. And EFI gives instant performance at all RPM. I don't miss carbs at all.

The only thing wrong with today's technology is the cost to repair anything. I used to pay less to buy a brand new vehicle than I do to finance a major repair today. Tundra tires just cost me a GRAND, fer chrissake!

Larry Jaques fired this volley in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

Heh! I hired an East Indian once who hired on as hourly 'work' staff at the fireworks plant, but who professed to be a degreed mechanical engineer by trade.

It became clear early on that he had zero manual skills, and no knowledge of tools or physical methods. He was simply astounded and enthralled by a simple scissor-style PVC pipe cutter, when it was demonstrated to him.

I once asked him, as inoffensively as I could, how it could be the case that he was both degreed in the trade, and absent the manual skills. He said, "Oh, engineers nebber get deyer hands durty! Dat is for de laborers! We design... Dey make de products!"

OhhhhhhKaayyyyy!

Never met an engineer worth his salt who couldn't turn a wrench!

LLoyd

Actually it is quite common in parts of Asia. Largely because in the developing countries people who attain a collage degree usually come from wealthy families. Do you spend all that money to have the kid out mucking about with the hired help :-)

I kept up while the company was willing to pay for the CAD seat, and used the same program later at Segway. Advancing tech made more complex designs feasible, but didn't actually speed the small, simple ones because of the growing overhead of setup.

The older DOS version was easier to use because it wasn't as burdened with complex options.

This reflects mainly his inexperience with it, but it really is illogical and difficult to learn

It needs to be continuous under the signal path, like the shield around coax which carries the same current as the signal in the reverse direction. I learned to carefully account for ground return current paths in sensitive or high-speed circuits at the ATE company. Whether to use a continuous or single-point ground can be a difficult judgement call. The ATE company had separate grounds and rules for digital, analog and measurement. Only some of them helped when I was shunted by a reorg from computer logic into microwave digital radio without any training or previous experience and had to pick it up FAST.

The company sponsored a Ham Radio class taight by a Brit radar wizard retiree which helped considerably. He would describe some exotic property of the Ionosphere and then tell us which of the antennas on the lawn outside he had used to measure it.

They were clustered around the oscilloscope, asking me to explain what they were looking at on their own designs.

Lawsuits are an effective way to destroy a startup you can't compete with technically. I've dodged close involvement in several, once because I knew alternate commercial uses of of a circuit idea they claimed was proprietary, though not patented.

I gravitated toward Ph.Ds who wanted to and could create something, or they did toward me. The trouble was that they'd leave for other opportunities as soon as the project was complete. The more academic, less innovative ones stayed where they were secure, but sent me no lab work.

-jsw

I've met and worked with a lot of them and they didn't know what to make of me; multilingual, very well educated and entirely willing to take on delicate manual lab work. I did the miniscule soldering for a Chinese female engineer who couldn't.

The Industrial Revolution and the modern world arose mainly from the discoveries of well-educated Englishmen of the Royal Society who were willing to experiment with their own hands.

plus a few foreign experimentalists like Lavoisier.

I've debated this with an engineer from Bangladesh who couldn't understand why Europe had so suddenly surpassed Indian culture, and didn't like my answers

-jsw

I see.

Remember back when you could run a computer on a 17kb kernel and programs were a few kb themselves?

I found Adobe Illustrator to be extremely much that way. Why write illogical and tough-to-learn software?

I hope you had help from current users/designers/techies.

Taight? Sounds more like a Scot. ;)

Oy, vay.

You were very lucky.

That doesn't sound like much fun.

I started with 256 -bytes- of RAM.

A sympathetic engineer gave me some vendor's samples of HM6116 2K x 8 static RAM so I could write a useable operating system, text editor and assembler. They are pin-compatible with 2716 UVPROMs but I changed things too much to want the code locked in a PROM. The EEPROM (flash) version was useful when I finally got one.

Before I added battery backup to the first 6116 I had to toggle in a

32-byte bootstrap loader from the minicomputer-style front panel switches, then run it to read a Teletype tape whose last act was to overwrite the Reset0 jump destination with its own entry point.

With battery-backed memory the machine would wake to whatever it was doing when turned off, like this XP one.

We were all advancing beyond our previous experience. That's the nature of R&D.

The ink is wearing off my laptop's external keyboard. I keep using it because it's narrow enough to fit the mouse pad along side it on the pull-out shelf.

-jsw

But what would 22 inch tires have cost back when? Figure out the cost in hours worked - not dollars - and you are still getting a bargoon. 16 inch light duty truck tiresay 225/75/16 cost about $150 each today. For a skilled worker - say a mechanic, plumber, or electrician today that tire represents mabee 5 hours of work. Back in 1973 5 hours of a mechanic's time was $25 - an electricians, about $40. From what I remember, that would not buy a decent 16" truck tire in 1973. I remember $72 for a cheap truck tire. A fancy oversized "mudder" tire was closer to $150 back then. Damn close to a week's takehome pay.

OK, you win.

Wow, Jameco! I haven't heard that name in damnear 40 years.

Grok that.

I always wear out the nubs on the F and J keys on my keyboards, so my hand positions sometimes get one key off, making the resultant typing a real jumble.