The Amp Hour Electronics Podcast

Dave and Chris talk trade shows, demos, light up hardware, bluetooth, obsolete processors, sustaining engineering, and more

This week Dave and Chris talk about upcoming demos, bluetooth, car troubles, new silicon, parts in the lab, and more!

Carl Bugeja joins Chris to talk about building PCB motors and actuators, starting a new business, documenting build processes on YouTube, manufacturing flexible circuits, and much more!

Dave and Chris discuss EVs, adapting power tool batteries for projects on the bench, robots, software updates, and more!

Pallav Aggarwal of CAPUF Embedded joins Chris to talk about blogging about learning electronics and helping others learn along the way! Pallav does teardowns, chip walkthroughs (like on the CH32V003), Linux projects, custom hardware, and more!

Chris and Dave discuss SPICE in CAD programs, new software releases, startup paperwork, crazy smarthome stuff, and toothbrushes that give away your data.

Dave and Chris talk through Renesas acquiring Altium and all its implications. Also Dave gives a history of Altium and they discuss how the industry might change (or not).

This week Chris and Dave discuss relativistic time differences, building with RISC V components, RF modules, silly consumer hardware, underwater electronics, and more!

Keith Burzinski of Nabu Casa works on ESPhome and making it easier to attach custom hardware to the open source home assistant project. He joins Chris to talk about the realities of offline smart home setups and how you can get started building custom things.

Dave returns after a few weeks on holiday to chat with Chris about robots, maker companies merging, hyped up tech at CES (and beyond), trains, power grids...and more!

Jeff Keyzer of Mightyohm.com joins Chris for a later-than-usual holiday episode, recording on what will be known as The Twelfth Day of Keyzermas

Dave and Chris discuss moon landings, oscilloscopes, design decisions for limited peripherals on microcontrollers, coding, smart home programs, and more!

Benjamin Cabé, developer advocate for the Zephyr Project, joins Chris to talk about the popular Ecosystem and Real Time Operating System (RTOS). Listen if you'd like to get started with an exciting firmware product that can really enhance your next project.

Chris and Dave return after a few guests shows and missed weeks when Chris was out with a new baby in the household. This week we talked about China, chip supply, RISC V, PCB tradeshows, LED factories, and more!

Jeff Geerling of the Jeff Geerling YouTube channel joins Chris to talk about how to explore the wide variety of computing devices, from an ESP32 monitor on your garage, all the way up to a multi-rack server.

Andreas Olofsson is the CEO of ZeroASIC, a company that will build you a custom ASIC using chiplets. He returns to The Amp Hour to talk about what has changed in the chip(let) industry in the last 8 years and how they will lower the cost for quasi custom designs for the masses.

Kathy Joseph from Kathy Loves Physics joins Dave on The Amp Hour to discuss history and physics and we end up discussing the intricate history of the development of the Cathode Ray Tube.

James Adams and Liam Fraser of the Raspberry Pi hardware team once again join Chris to talk about the RP1 custom silicon on the Raspberry Pi 5

Dave hangs out with Fran Blanche for her 4th appearance on the show. Space, Youtubing, tube testing, storage nightmares, and oopsies.

Chris and Dave discuss selling low volume hardware, old stock of chips, Intel's weird investments, creating oddball PCBs, scopes without fans, and more!

Scott Williams returns to The Amp Hour after 6 months to discuss the technical aspects of consulting, including some of the tools he reaches for when building a new product

Dave and Chris discuss fitness trackers and smartwatches, boomboxes, buying off of eBay, design decisions, and contract manufacturing.

Dave and Ian Scott Johnston discuss the PDVS2mini DC Voltage Calibrator Source, production, China, CERN, ebay reselling, test gear, pick and place machines, assembly, automated test systems, and Youtube repair videos.

Chris and Dave recount modems, handsets, trains, 2n2222 transistors, RISC V, and a complete lack of knowledge of how superconductors work.

Fellow Aussie Toby Robb joins Dave to discuss everything related to mains power generation and transmission and his role as a linesman.

Werner Johansson of Qoitech has been working on controlling power supplies with software for a long time. He joins Chris to talk about building systems that can quickly respond to the world, including a heavy focus on battery characterization.

Chris and Dave discuss efficiencies of different types of power generation, building with new chips, new test equipment, building with chiplets and feeling very dumb. All that and more!

Aedan Cullen has built some amazingly compact electronics in order to create Augmented Reality (AR) headsets. He joins Chris to talk about hardware challenges and building the next (small) big thing.

CNLohr joins Chris to talk about doing more with small parts like the CH32V003. CN has been working on the publicly available CH32V003fun library, and recently implemented SW only USB!

Dave and Chris discuss a teardown of a prosumer recording product, choices around cable connectors, 3G cellular networks, and the end of the EAGLE era

Andrea Longobardi from AL2tech joins Chris to talk about consulting, projects in the gas monitoring space, finding early clients, moving outside chip companies, and low power connected device design.

Dr Ken Tindell joins Chris to explain the CAN bus, including the history and how CAN is used in modern day cars. Also car hacking, self-driving car questions, standards in the trucking industry, and what automotive computing will look like in the future.

This week Chris and Dave talk about the regular tasks engineers have in front of them when building a new hardware project: battery, data, features, etc. That plus low cost hardware, hacking devices, figuring out new projects, and more

Dave talks with Steve Sanghi who was Microchip CEO for 31 years, now Executive Chair.

Chris and Dave discuss how CAN bus is in fact, a "noisy rude bus". Also working with piezo speakers, strain gauges, manufacturing considerations, and getting your proto off the bench quickly.

Ari Gerstman from the Department of Energy SCEP Office joins Chris to talk through US Renewable Energy Policy. They discuss the impacts of growing electrication in the US and how spending is driving new industries.

Chris regales Dave with the story of his spooky electrical problems at his house (subject of the puzzler in 628). Also choosing new micros, recently announced micros, and blown up space toys.

Dave Young joins Chris in-person to record about learning firmware, weird power issues, and encouraging engineering education.

Chris and Dave discuss compiling code in an automated way, as well as recent Aussie tech events, EE retirement, open source equipment, and more!

Sergiy Nesterenko of Quilter.ai joins Chris to talk about automating board layout using learning algoritms and parallel cloud compute. Check out how the boards come back with unconventional looks, but well tested electrical characteristics.

This week Chris and Dave get sucked into talking about AI...but question what happens when it's broadly used. Who will understand the underlying systems? Who will be able to troubleshoot? Chris also brings up his learning plan for new tech.

Scott Williams from Xentronics in Melbourne joins Dave to discuss setting up and running a design and manufacturing consulting business.

Dave and Chris discuss prototypes for trade shows, power supplies, current consumption, shipping logistics and much more.

Mike Szczys returns for a second time to talk about creating firmware and hardware for trade shows like the upcoming Embedded World conference in Nuremberg Germany.

Dave and Chris discuss calipers, IoT devices, Git, eInk, new chip companies, and more!

Dr Don WIlcher is an engineer and an educator. He joins Chris to talk about working inside industrial facilities, designing electronics for autos, and inspiring the next generation of engineers through teaching.

This week Dave and Chris record during the Superbowl, but ignore sports and talk about finding bugs, creating prototypes, flash based microcontollers, carbon offsets, car wiring harnesses...and more!

Amitabh Shrivastava is a physicist turned engineer and a prolific maker. He joins Chris to talk about projects with portable refrigeration and soft robotics.

This week Dave and Chris discuss interesting PCB features, testing RISC V parts, better recording set-ups, layoffs in the tech industry, solar panels, and more!

Matthew Venn of the Zero To Asic course returns to The Amp Hour to talk about what has been happening in the world of Open Source Silicon, both the tools that make things go and the projects that people are creating.