seeing eye dog for old techs

I can highly recommend the Leica A60, but it's not the sort of thing that a hobbyist would likely want to spend their money on. Some of the Chinese ones are also pretty decent and maybe half the price (even less on eBay but I've not tried the really cheap ones).

Getting the breakout boards with chips soldered on them is a cute trick, thanks!

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

Lloyd, thanks for griping about it ;-) I actually went back and read your first post, which was indeed useful and new information (to me).

Another option that is sometimes available is to get an evaluation board for the chip, often (not always) they are sold inexpensively, come with the chip and support stuff (new stuff often needs lots of supplies etc.) all populated. A lot of the TI ones are like $20.

There's a new Ethernet PHY chip I'd like to evaluate, unfortunately the eval board for it is $400 and the eval board I have in hand for the processor has the relevant pins hidden under the mounted chip and going nowhere. I don't feel like trying to wire a 256-pin BGA up manually, so a 6 layer fine pitch board is about the minimum. Or buy another $400 eval board for the MCU, spend an hour or two hacking them together and then I'm in $800 + a few hours and no further ahead with making the first real board. 8-(

I have (electronic) test jigs and such like that are made using evaluation boards.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

Spehro Pefhany fired this volley in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

Bob and Spehro, Thanks. I figured there must be at least a few folks here for whom that would be a worthwhile service.

These days, the line between what's 'machine' and what is 'electronics' is so blurred that you cannot succeed well in the industry without using some of both skills.

And, to the guy who's doing this sort of thing daily, it IS "like passing out $100 bills".

I bill at over $100/hour. It would take me way more than an hour to Eagle-up, isolation mill, and solder a board, just to evaluate or prototype something. I figure that every time I pay them four or five bucks to solder a chip for me, I'm earning at least a couple of Ben Franklins.

LLoyd

Since the message I saw and replied to had Gunner's (then Tim's) headers up top, I guess it has.

Cool.

Given the chance, neither would I.

Not if you can talk the client into paying for it.

It's your fault, really. I mean, you're down here rubbing elbows with us unwashed types... ;)

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

It's still wasting their money, and doesn't earn me as much as if I'd had a faster way. If I care about their outcomes, they usually care about mine.

Lloyd

I've only run across one chip (module actually) that I cannot reliably solder by hand with an iron -- and that one chip I can solder with a heat gun to the back of a board.

Tim Wescott fired this volley in news:Mo- snipped-for-privacy@giganews.com:

Ok... try this one, and keep the thermal profile where it needs to be -- with a heat gun.

(read the datasheet before you answer)

Lloyd

You could look for a 'low' cost dissecting microscope:

"Lloyd E. Sponenburgh" fired this volley in news:XnsA1B37C03FB21Alloydspmindspringcom@216.168.3.70:

No quite.. you were right before, when you wrote you must've been wrong.

It ain't like you were offering a kidney.

Never said I was a machinist.. but I recommend the movie, well, for mature viewers anyway. The Machinist (2004)

I never cared much for kidneys.

Nope, a nested acronym from the 1980's, courtesy of US government. V = acronym for VHSIC = Very high speed integrated circuit HDL as Pete says correctly above.

Jon

OK, well, this is quite a bit more specialized than most people are working with. I recently got a Weller WHA900 hot air tool, and this works quite nicely for removing big FPGAs and such without damaging the board. Not so clear about damage to the chips, but it seems they can usually be reused, if that was the purpose of the rework.

I have often done prototyping using a board that used the same land pattern, even if it didn't use the same chip. (if it used the same chip, then power and ground pins would be in the same place, a definite bonus.)

Well, I design stuff by assembling a bunch of off-the-shelf components, if that is what you mean.

Jon

Well, okay, the problem with this is the round-trip time. When I figure out I need a particular part on a project, I can start hand-carving a piece of PC board material, and have a simple circuit built up in an hour. Now, if I have to order the part from Digi-Key, then maybe Proto-Advantage can get me the adapter almost as fast. As it is, now, I have accumulated such a HUGE junkbox that I can build an awful lot of stuff out of parts on hand, and thereby eliminate putting the project on hold waiting for parts.

Jon

Agreed.

I don't do it nearly as often as you do -- and I mostly use my old collection of TTL chips in DIP packages when I do -- but ...

And I still use wire-wrap for a lot of things when I do toss together a circuit.

I appreciate it -- and I kept out of the discussion because I did not see anything useful I could add. And the number of people who thought they knew what you are doing/what you need -- and don't is amazing.

Thanks, DoN.

These days, people here are convertering older machines to more modern CNC -- so logic design and prototyping is a reasonable skill to expect among some of us, at least.

You don't convert older CNC machines to newer controllers?

Self -- mirror

Enjoy, DoN.

It doesn't matter to me (anymore) what anyone posts, but in about 15 years of participating in usenet groups, I think this was only the 3rd instance of someone complaining about, essentially, not receiving an award for their menial contribution.

Most conversions can be accomplished with off-the-shelf (or off eBag) products, from what I've seen over the years.

No.. I like manual metalworking machines, and it's not for income, it's rec-re-freakin-ation (as the Rcm acronym represents), and as numerous RCMers have pointed out over the years (including yourself, probably).

Self-mirror indeed, DoN.

This is true. But every once in awhile, I try to tell a client that he could get someone cheaper to do the task but he wants me to do it. On occasion, I'll stoop to it. On other occasions, I'll gladly relax and do the simple task for lots of money and we're both happy.

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

LLoyd

"Wild_Bill" fired this volley in news:cYlgt.773184$ snipped-for-privacy@en-nntp-11.dc.easynews.com:

But hardly the first or even fiftieth instance of you and your ilk loudly denying the worth of someone's recommendation, just because you don't personally have a need for it. (or worse, do, but don't understand the issues)

Like the dolt who suggested soldering SMTs with a heat gun without knowing WHAT SMTs I was working with... That's like saying "I can perform surgery with an English Broadsword", before finding out it's a mouse on which eye surgery must be done.

Bill, if you have zero electronics skills, then light switches might be a challenge. Certainly you do not need pre-populated SMT breakout boards.

But that hardly makes the concept worthless.

LLoyd