#300 – Three Hundred Down, Three Hundred To Go

Chris Gammell: This is The Amp Hour Podcast. Recorded May 25th, 2016. Episode 300. 300 down, 300 to go.

Dave Jones: Welcome to The Amp Hour. I'm Dave Jones from the EEV blog.

Chris Gammell: And I'm Chris Gammell of Contextual Electronics. And you... And yes, I sound like crap. Yeah, I was going to say, you said you are sick. You are quite sick.

Dave Jones: I am very sick at the moment, so yeah.

Chris Gammell: Sick in the chest, sick in the knee, and sick in the head, like usual. The sick in the neck is nothing different.

Dave Jones: No. But yes, I just had my first MRI scan last night.

Chris Gammell: But if listeners don't know, Dave's actually in pretty decent shape most of the time. And he's no spring chicken. And he basically, he wasted his knee.

Dave Jones: I busted my knee doing something really stupid at the gym that I shouldn't have. And I'm so used to my body just performing and not having a problem. And nope, looks like I busted my ACL.

Chris Gammell: That is why you don't go to the gym, Dave. Don't do it. Right. Right. Yep.

Dave Jones: Yeah. No, anyway. It's bad. Like, I did this seven months ago. And I thought it was getting... Like, I didn't get diagnosed as an ACL issue. Then they sort of said, oh, I don't know. You know, x-rays and ultrasounds didn't really show anything. And no, just last week, I did it yet again. So I went to have an MRI. And yeah, I'm going to the doctor after this. So he just called me up and said, yep, you're ACL, dude. You're going to an orthopedic surgeon. You are a toast. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, I was booked in to see a specialist who has a two-month waiting list. I was booked in to go see him in August. But how can anyone have a two-month backlog? It's amazing.

Chris Gammell: That's not good in the healthcare stuff. It's, yes.

Dave Jones: Yeah. I bet, yeah. Well, this is like a knee specialist. Like, this is like a sports specialist who does all the football teams and stuff. So I'm sure if I was a football player, I'd get straight in, you know.

Chris Gammell: Do you... Have I ever mentioned on the show before... So I think I might have mentioned... I saw Dr. Hugh Herr speak. It was a long time ago. It was like one of the first conferences I went to.

Dave Jones: About what?

Chris Gammell: Did I ever mention that? So I don't know. Do you know who he is or no? Don't recall.

Dave Jones: No.

Chris Gammell: No idea. He's at MIT Media Lab. And he's got a startup or two as well. But basically, he lost his legs below the knee when he's like 17 in a climbing accident. And then basically, he went into school, got into like biomechatronics stuff. And then now has a company basically with inventing prosthetics that are pretty advanced. Like the control systems on the ankle are very natural looking. And... But the thing that I've always remembered about that talk... I mean, I remember him obviously showing the ankles were very cool looking. And that was, you know, five, six years ago even.

Dave Jones: Do these ankles look like our ankles? Do they look... Or do they look completely different? Yeah.

Chris Gammell: I think there's some biomimicry there for sure. I mean, like there was...

Speaker ?: Right.

Chris Gammell: Okay. I mean, probably not as many axes of rotation and stuff. I think it was, you know, one or two instead of, you know, whatever the ball joint is. Like on a... Yeah. Yeah. Effectively right. Right. Not infinite. Right. Well... But higher, yeah, higher order. Yeah. And, you know, we can both preface this with we are not... We don't know anything about medical... I don't know anything about medical stuff. But anyways, his assertion was that in the future, he was actually talking about elderly people. But the, you know, if you have the option to switch to a prosthetic...

Dave Jones: Oh, yes. You've mentioned this. Then... I have mentioned it.

Chris Gammell: Okay, okay. You're actually better off doing it. People elective... Yeah, electively do that kind of thing. I've always remembered that. And I...

Dave Jones: I'm going to chop my arm off and I'm going to replace it with a better arm.

Chris Gammell: Well, yeah. And I think... I mean, he was talking about chronic pain. But, you know, like, so it's kind of relevant here. It's like... If... So, say, for some reason your knee couldn't be fixed and you still wanted to do jumping and you were unable to do that with, you know, elective surgery like that, that would be... Yeah. Crazy, right? I mean, it depends how important it is to you.

Dave Jones: Actually, totally replace your knee. No thanks.

Chris Gammell: It would be your whole leg at that point, you know.

Dave Jones: Right. Yeah, yeah. Exactly. Yeah. No thanks.

Chris Gammell: It's... It would be a very tough decision, I think. But it's still interesting from a... You know... Yeah. Moving towards human cyborg stuff. So...

Dave Jones: Right.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. So, I hope your knee feels better, man. Hopefully you don't need to do that.

Dave Jones: Well, but, yeah, I think surgery's on the card, so...

Chris Gammell: Yeah, that sucks. We'll see.

Dave Jones: Why are MRI... Have you ever had an MRI scan?

Chris Gammell: I never have, no.

Dave Jones: They're... I have... They are so slow.

Chris Gammell: Oh, because they're huge magnets. I know that. I know.

Dave Jones: They're huge magnets, but I want to... Now I'm curious. I want to know, because it took about 20 minutes for this scan. So, I got... Just on my knee. Like, there's people who have full body MRIs, don't they, or something?

Chris Gammell: Oh, yeah.

Dave Jones: Crazy like that, you know. Like, yeah. Like, serious.

Chris Gammell: Well, I never know the... There's different types, too, because there's, like, the different types of scans. But usually they're magnetically slicing. Like, MRI is what? Magnetic resonance imaging.

Dave Jones: Yeah, they're magnetically slicing, and they move, you know. Like, you wait for, like, three minutes. There's actually a countdown timer above your head. And, you know, when it counts down, then it moves the table forward, and it shows you the millimeter increments and stuff like that on the machine. But, you know, 20 minutes just for a knee. And so, I've got to sit there, you know, with my... Desperate to cough in my weakened state. Oh, right, right, right. And I couldn't move. And I want to know what the bottleneck is. If anyone knows about MRI machine design and where the bottleneck is, is it the rotation of the magnet? Does it have to stay steady for 10 seconds at each angle? Does it... What's the... What's the limitation?

Chris Gammell: Well, I would imagine that, you know, something like your... Like, that is... Obviously, you have a cough at the same time, but, like, you know, that versus, like, having a higher resolution thing for, like, a brain or something. They probably have different... You know, there's different generations, I'm sure, as well.

Dave Jones: Oh, yeah, no, of course. Yeah, yeah.

Chris Gammell: You know.

Dave Jones: But, yeah, I'm just curious to what the... But, yeah, I don't know. I know it's got to scan around in full 360 degree and then do another slice and move forward. But why... You know, okay, maybe it takes 20 minutes. I don't know how many slices they did of it. You know, maybe they did, I don't know, 100 slices or something, maybe.

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: But, yeah. In fact, they must have, because I think it was a 1mm... It started out as a 2mm increment slice. That's what the machine said, anyway, above my head. Yeah, yeah. And then it dropped down to 1mm. So, I'm not sure if it does, like, a rough pass first and then it does a finer pass or what. But, you know, is it the... Yeah. I want to know where the bottleneck is. Yeah, they must...

Chris Gammell: Do they strap you in? Like, are you really constrained as well? Like, you're like...

Dave Jones: Not... Like, there is, like, a thing that goes over your knee. Yeah. It doesn't really hold you in tight. No, no, I can easily wiggle around and squirm around. Okay, okay. And she, you know, the nurse went, geez, you're not really a squirmer, are you? No, because apparently they get squirming. People fidget in there and, you know, and it just ruins you.

Chris Gammell: That's the loud one, right? That's the loud...

Dave Jones: It is loud, yeah. So, they actually put headphones, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So, they give you headphones and play your terrible local radio station.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, because I know they have those... Like, for kids, too, they'll really try and distract them if they have to go in. Because they're kind of... It's like, it's a toroid, right? Like, a toroid shape where you're going into the middle of the toroid.

Dave Jones: Yeah, yeah, you're going into a big... Yes.

Speaker ?: Mm-hmm.

Dave Jones: A huge toroidal ring. And the magnets, you know, swing around that inside somehow. But, yeah, I'm just curious to know what the bottleneck is.

Chris Gammell: Well, I'm sure... And whether or not it's engineering completed or whether or not... Okay. It did say there's new stuff coming out, but, like, reading any of those, like, oh, well, it's getting faster or, you know, a new breakthrough is, like, yeah, in 10 years kind of thing, you know? So, yeah, no, but we should... How about this? We should put this out there. If there are people that work... I actually used to... I knew a guy that works at one of the GE ones. But I think a lot of them probably wouldn't be able to talk about it, you know? So, yeah.

Dave Jones: Hang on. Advance makes MRI scans more than seven times faster. Yeah, that's what I thought, too. You're getting that right.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. So, anyways, we'll look at... Obviously, we shouldn't just read... We'll update you in the next episode. Yeah. Oh, my God. Yeah. Dude, this is the 300th episode. We didn't even mention it.

Dave Jones: Oh, holy crap. There you go. Yeah.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. Dave completely destroyed his need to celebrate our 300th episode. Yes, that's it.

Dave Jones: I'll never be the same again. Oh, man.

Chris Gammell: Oh, man. Yeah, that is interesting how that works, though. We'll have to look into that. Yeah. I have to apologize for the noise that will probably come through here. I am in San Francisco right now at a noisy office. That's all right. Yeah. But I just got out of... Well, it was just Maker Faire last weekend. And that was another successful one. Although, I don't know. Like, there was obviously a lot of the people that I like are there. And I wanted to, you know, see everyone that I already know. But in terms of meeting new people or seeing new things, like, there weren't as many, like, new demos as I thought there would be. Right. I don't know what I expect anymore. But...

Dave Jones: Right.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. So... Oh, and I gave a talk. There you go. I gave a talk.

Dave Jones: Oh, yes. How'd that go? How many people came up? About revision control?

Chris Gammell: I don't know, like 20, 25 people. Nothing huge. But I did film it. I think my audio cut out halfway through, so that might suck. But I will try and post that at some point. And you can learn all about revision control, Dave.

Dave Jones: Fantastic. Thank you very much. That's what I've always wanted.

Chris Gammell: Right. Right. Well, then... So part of the talk, too, though, I did mention that Altium does have revision control. And you knew that. I mean, obviously you knew that. Yeah, of course. Yeah, yeah. But you still don't use it, right?

Dave Jones: Uh, no. No.

Chris Gammell: Why don't you?

Dave Jones: I just... Because my designs aren't worthy enough.

Chris Gammell: Just like the overhead cost?

Dave Jones: Yeah. I just couldn't be bothered. There's no... I've never needed to. You know? Well, no. I have in various jobs I've needed to. Sure, sure. Oh, you're just saying personal. Projects, yeah. My own personal projects just aren't big enough to warrant it.

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: And I'm sure you'll argue that. But, hey, I just couldn't care less. I've just never... You know?

Speaker ?: Yep.

Chris Gammell: Yep. That's nice.

Dave Jones: They're after you, dude. They're after you. I know, right? Yep.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, so I did see... There were some cool things there, though. So I think... I mean, I think everybody saw it. If they haven't seen it, though, the Monster 6502, you saw that, I'm sure, right?

Dave Jones: Oh, yes. That's, yeah, beautiful. So I saw it.

Chris Gammell: I did not realize that it was actually operational. When I first heard about it...

Dave Jones: Oh, you've actually physically seen it?

Chris Gammell: Yeah, yeah. Eric. So it's Eric Schlepfer. He also runs... So his site is tubetime.us. He's... We've mentioned him on the show before, I know, because he's done a couple other interesting... Oh, he's the one who... So he works with the Evil Matt Scientist. You know, those huge 555 kits that they do? Oh, yes, right. The large 740 ones. So that was Eric working with them, developing those products.

Dave Jones: Oh, got it. Okay, cool.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. And those are such a great... I didn't realize they're like 30 or 40 bucks. Like, I always thought there were more, but like, that's like a really good...

Dave Jones: Yeah, no, the Felicit. Yeah.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. I mean, that's great, though. I just... I love that form factor. It's really fun.

Dave Jones: But it's as far... Like, I thought it was bigger than this. I'm actually watching the video now. It's like a desktop unit. Is it all on a single board? Is it all on that front panel board?

Chris Gammell: It's a single board. It's like half a panel. It's like half a panel size. But he said that any board shop will only do one of those boards per panel kind of thing. Right.

Dave Jones: Oh, yeah, of course. Yeah. So how... But like... So he's using discrete FETs, is he?

Chris Gammell: Uh-huh. Yep.

Dave Jones: Right. And so it just didn't look like there were that many FETs. I thought the 6502 had like 10,000 transistors or something.

Chris Gammell: There's a couple of multi... Sorry, multi-transistor packages, I think, on there. Maybe only a couple. Oh, okay. Right. But, I mean, he's using small stuff, like SC70, stuff like that. Yeah. Oh, right. Yeah, there's a lot of little parts on there. Right. But, yeah, I'm not really sure because I think he's also adding stuff. Like, you obviously didn't need LEDs on the original, you know, the die. Yeah, yeah, of course. No, no.

Dave Jones: But you've got to have that to make it look funky, of course.

Chris Gammell: Oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And so it was really cool to see that, like, kind of just seeing how stuff goes through. I was talking to him during the fair a little bit. He said there was two type of people. Like, one was just people walking by and going, ooh, Blinky. And another one, he said people who knew what it was, they just, like, stopped and their jaw dropped. Yeah, right. You know, like, people who started out with those things. Yeah, of course. With 6502s and stuff. Yeah. Yeah. So that's great. Yeah, it's brilliant.

Dave Jones: No, I can understand how, why, you know, anyone under 30 just would walk by that and go, ooh, Blinky. Yeah, Blinky, right. Like, they just wouldn't know. And that's not their fault, you know. And not everyone has to know the history of microprocessors, you know. Right. Yeah.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, so it did actually run code, which was really impressive, I thought. Yeah, it's cool. And he said it took him six. I think Mike's, the video we'll post is Mike talking to him. But he said it was, like, six months of layout and, like, reverse engineering stuff. Wow.

Dave Jones: Wow. That's crazy.

Chris Gammell: That is crazy. Yeah, that's really crazy.

Dave Jones: Yeah. Huge hats off to that. Why the black solder mask? Oh, God, I hate black solder mask.

Chris Gammell: Oh, I like black solder mask. What do you like? Hate it. Hate it.

Dave Jones: Hate it. Why? I worked at Audion for four years. Everything was black solder mask. Oh, I see. Hate it. Hate it.

Chris Gammell: I think it looks cool. I mean, I guess, yeah, I guess you could get sick of it, so.

Dave Jones: Yep. Anyway. All right. What else we got on our list this week?

Chris Gammell: What else is on here? I made a thing. I don't think anyone cares about it. It's stupid, but. What sort of thing?

Dave Jones: Oh, I write the heart thing.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, the heart thing. It was mostly just an excuse to do 3D printing. Right, yeah, of course. Yeah.

Speaker ?: Yeah.

Chris Gammell: So I printed, 3D printed a plastic heart, and then I put it onto this old, my old, my, the fourth time I've repurposed the Iron Man stupid badge thing I made. Yeah, right. Yeah, I know. Yeah. I've used that a ton.

Dave Jones: Oh, now you're calling it stupid, are you? I thought, you know. I mean, I've just. You thought it was the duck's guts when you first did it.

Chris Gammell: When I first, when I did the first thing, it was actually because of the machining that I was very proud of. Oh, right. The plastic. Okay. Yeah, I mean, the LEDs have always been, so whatever, you know, but, yeah.

Dave Jones: There's a, you're right. There's a few of your favorite topic stories today. Robots, the rise of the robots.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, well, who do you think posted them?

Dave Jones: Yeah, right. Come on.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, so.

Dave Jones: Extol the virtues of our robot overlords, yet again.

Chris Gammell: I mean, I think it's not too much. Actually, there are, there's three stories here, huh? I mean, so basically it's just, so one was, you know, the Foxconn promised that a while ago, right, that they were going to be moving towards, be moving towards replacing human workers with robotic workers. And so they started talking, actually.

Dave Jones: In what aspects, though?

Chris Gammell: I think assembly and stuff like that. I mean, it's not going to be like fine motor control stuff yet, but it's, it's moving towards that way. And, you know, there's material handling stuff. I think they also, I think, I think this article, though, also started to get into even like pick and place type stuff, which is not quite what you think about, you know? Hmm. So, you know, it's, you do have to ask them to, you have to kind of question what they're breaking, breaking things down into. But, and then there's other stuff about like McDonald's CEO or former McDonald's CEO talking about robots, but that's not really that big a deal, you know? I don't know. Like a lot of these things, I, I'm not so worried about this stuff, to be honest. Like.

Dave Jones: Like, that, that wasn't your opinion in the previous hundred episodes you've talked about?

Chris Gammell: No, no, no. I'm not worried about, I'm not worried about robots replacing like, you know, a front desk person at McDonald's type of thing. You know, like there's. Right. There is a limit to certain things, but I think it's actually, it's not this kind of stuff that's going to be the upheaval things. But I think it's going to be the, the long haul trucks driver stuff, the, you know, the replacing, and it's not even just robots, it's also automation, right? So like replacing lawyers with, with, no, seriously.

Dave Jones: IBM Watson or something.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, that's what they talk about. Well, I didn't think it was Watson, but it was just, you know, a large, a large part of what lawyers do is searching through case law. Right. Okay. Yep. Yep. Yeah. That kind of stuff.

Dave Jones: So you can use, you know, deep, deep learning systems to replace. Yeah, that kind of stuff.

Chris Gammell: I mean, that's just automation though. Right. And then there's another one. I mean, like, so, and, you know, they're also, you know, talking about these things about, there was a story about Germany and how they're using robotics to bring stuff back to Germany, like, like a shoe manufacturing. And it's like, okay, but, you know, how much of the, I mean, I think that, I think the main point is that regardless of whether it comes back to Germany, where apparently it used to be made, I didn't know that.

Dave Jones: And I had no idea Germany made shoes.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. And we're doing it in China. Like, it's not like China is not going to do it either. You know, like there is a crossover point in every, in every economic system where it's just automation is going to win because you can run it effectively 24 hours a day, not in reality, but effectively 24 hours a day. So, yeah, you're, I mean, automation will always win out eventually. It's just a matter of when and which tasks go first.

Dave Jones: And if it's suitable. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah.

Chris Gammell: I think we talked about it back, you know, a couple of times ago, we've obviously talked about this stuff a lot, but there was a, there was a measure of how likely it is your job is going to get automated. And there's a lot of people out there where it will be, you know, like it's, it's just reality.

Dave Jones: I think I'm pretty safe now from the automation side of things. Right. I've probably made a step in the right direction in terms of my career.

Chris Gammell: Right. Right.

Dave Jones: I don't think I'm going to be replaced by Max Hedrum anytime soon.

Chris Gammell: Right. Well, I don't think robots will ever quite perfect the Aussie accent either. So you're probably good on that front.

Dave Jones: Excellent.

Chris Gammell: In the outback, nobody knows you're a robot.

Dave Jones: Speaking of robots, guess what? I'm going to, oh, I said, no, I've already, no, I've already said it on Twitter. So it's not really a spoiler. Okay. Although it may be. Guess what I'm going to get a look at next month.

Chris Gammell: No, I don't know. And a play with.

Dave Jones: And get to be able to drive around my lab.

Chris Gammell: Is it around the lab?

Dave Jones: Around the lab.

Chris Gammell: I don't know.

Dave Jones: A moon rover.

Chris Gammell: Really?

Dave Jones: A genuine freaking moon rover. Yes.

Chris Gammell: Oh, that's awesome.

Dave Jones: I know.

Chris Gammell: I will say no more.

Dave Jones: I will say no more. Come on.

Chris Gammell: That's not cool.

Dave Jones: No, if I tell you who and which one and all that sort of stuff, that's probably a spoiler.

Chris Gammell: Okay. All right. Well, lucky you.

Dave Jones: But I have arranged for a genuine moon rover to be here in the lab.

Chris Gammell: Okay. And that's cool.

Dave Jones: It's awesome.

Chris Gammell: Do you know if it has a remote control? Is it like that? Do you know how you're driving it?

Dave Jones: I don't know how it's controlled. Yeah. It's some sort of remote control. It isn't actually tethered. So I assume you control it on your phone or a tablet or something.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. That's cool. That's cool.

Dave Jones: Yeah. But no, it's a genuine moon rover that's going to the moon.

Chris Gammell: Going to the moon? Well, probably not the one. It's not coming back.

Dave Jones: But it's the prototype. It's the prototype that they're doing all the development on. And then, of course, they would carefully handle and assemble one with nude virgins that actually goes to the moon. But, yep. Right. It is the real deal. Yep. Nice. And I don't know how many tens of millions they would have spent developing this thing. But, yeah.

Chris Gammell: Not the one you're getting.

Dave Jones: Well, yeah. They've probably spent millions on it. Yeah. But not manufacturing, right? No. Well, not manufacturing it.

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: But, yep. Anyway, it's very cool. And I will be getting the designer of it, too.

Chris Gammell: Well, I figure they wouldn't just ship it to you.

Dave Jones: No. They're not just, you know, mailbag. Yeah, right, right, right.

Chris Gammell: God, this is a big box.

Dave Jones: Oh, dear. Yep. Anyway. That's cool. So I hope that all comes together.

Chris Gammell: So Mike Harrison's in town now. He's giving a talk tomorrow at this thing I've thrown.

Dave Jones: He's everywhere now, Mike, as he decided to suddenly travel all of a sudden.

Chris Gammell: Right. And, shoot, travel triggered me. I have to say this before I forget. I will be in Denver next week, and I'll mention that later. Or, sorry, on Sunday. So I will mention that later. But I was hanging out with Mike and Ariel Briner, who we've had on the show before. What was that called? I saw the photo. Yeah. What was that thing called? The circuit printer thingy.

Dave Jones: Oh, it's a mono scooter thing.

Chris Gammell: Mono. No, no, no. Yeah, anyways, Ariel was on the show before as well. But, yeah, so he has.

Dave Jones: Oh, their printer, their PCB printer thing.

Chris Gammell: Yes. You're talking about. What the hell is that thing called? Yeah. Anyways, I'll link to the episode.

Dave Jones: It's the Cartesian Co. It was their company.

Chris Gammell: That's right. Yeah, Cartesian. And so Ariel has this mono thing. And they're, you know, like all of these different devices that are out there now. But, man, they're just so cheap and like energy dense. I mean, obviously, there's been a lot of stuff about those hoverboards, you know, the two-wheeled hoverboard thingies. The batteries have been exploding. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. But just like the density of these things. Yeah. Of course. Of course. I mean, it's more of a public safety, just a general knowledge thing as well. But some of them have blown up, let's be honest. I mean, they started on fire. And, yeah. So it's just amazing to me, though. Like the practical. What I was really thinking about is remember when DECA, the Dean Kamenz thing, came out with the Segway. And they were talking about like the personalized transportation revolution type of thing. You know, and it's like. That flopped, isn't it? It totally did. But it was like, I mean, it found some use in like mall cops and airport cops. Yeah, rock mall. But it's amazing to me because now it's like it's been miniature. Obviously, there's tons of gyros out there now enhanced by the rise of, you know, iPhones or, you know, just smartphones in general. But just like it's batteries. It's a motor controller. It's a gyro and a wheel. And, you know, it's like there's nothing else to it. And yet. And it's like 230 bucks. You can literally buy one for 230 bucks. Yeah. And but like it has that has some serious like it can go 10 miles. I mean, like it's not like that is not a small thing. You know, that is a pretty significant. It's lightweight, obviously. And it has a skill kind of associated with riding it. But once you do like that's some serious people moving ability. I was very impressed by it. Like almost to the thought of getting one and crashing, you know, learning how to do it around my house. But like it's crazy. I mean, it looks silly, but it actually is a practical way of people to kind of move around. Yeah.

Dave Jones: But so is a skateboard, you know. But I know it's always a bicycle. And a lot of other things. Exactly. You know, but nobody wants to pick it up and carry it. Right. Nobody wants to, you know, unless they it magically unfolds from your shoes and then off you go. You know, nobody wants the hassle of, you know, actually picking the thing up and carrying it.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, I know. His has a handle kind of like a like a pull out handle, like a suitcase.

Dave Jones: Right. Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Gammell: And so you can just wheel it behind you when you're not using it.

Dave Jones: Oh, right. But yeah, no one wants that. I mean, it's always going to be a niche thing. Always.

Chris Gammell: Well, maybe. Yeah. I mean, well, no, not even maybe. I think you're right. But I was just struck by the by the energy density, like how much batteries this thing has. I mean, it's like it's I think it's like 300. I don't know what the battery store. I think it was like 230 million or amp hours. That doesn't sound right. Watt hours. I don't know.

Dave Jones: Watt hours is correct.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, just the amount of batteries in these things. Obviously, it's not different either from, you know, a Tesla has a ton of batteries as well. So, it's not like it's not like this is some new thing like, oh, where do these batteries come from? But, you know, it's just kind of trickling down into the rest of the ecosystem where a pretty lightweight stripped down device has some practical and low cost capabilities. Yep. So, I had not seen it. Right. Yeah. The things you see around San Francisco. Yeah, I know. Yeah.

Dave Jones: Yep. It's easily amused, folks.

Chris Gammell: Well, whatever, man. You're going to need one soon, Gimpy.

Dave Jones: Yeah, right. Even with my busted neck, still whip your ass. I'm sure you could.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, I know.

Dave Jones: Lazy nerd, you.

Chris Gammell: I know. I am a lazy nerd. Speaking of, I saw a book mentioned like two or three times on Reddit a while back, and I posted it. It doesn't really have much to do. I mean, it doesn't have anything to do with electronics, but I've never really done Python. Right. And there is this really nice looking book, and it's free online from Nostarch.

Dave Jones: I thought Python wasn't the flavor of the month anymore, or am I wrong?

Chris Gammell: Well, now that it's, you know, fallen out of favor, now it's cool, right? Oh, right.

Dave Jones: Now I get wrong.

Chris Gammell: No, I don't know. I don't know what it is. I mean, like, I just think it's about, you know, like, this is more like if you were going to do, you know, if you needed to help, like, doing, build material in Excel, and you wanted to kind of work with those kind of things, or if you wanted to, you know, just this is kind of like a book that's around hacking the office data type of stuff. Instead of, you know, maybe you could, I'm sure you could do other stuff with it. You could write plugins for KiCad or something like that, but this is just an interesting getting started kind of thing based around office type tasks, you know. Right. Web stuff, document stuff. It's great, though. That's the kind of stuff where I feel like that's where people really get into it. I would not suggest people start going into Python with, you know, all the hardware control that you see out there. It's like, yeah, maybe that's not the best place to do it. This is the kind of stuff that I feel like Python was really meant for, you know, like the scripting and the small tasks, stuff like that.

Dave Jones: Hey, something just popped into my head. Did we talk about this last time or not? It's not on the list, but I'll raise it anyway. One of your favorite pet topics, self-driving cars. Did we mention last time how there was an article, was it from Google, who said, no, self-driving cars are 20 plus years away?

Chris Gammell: We didn't mention that, but I know what you're talking about, yeah.

Dave Jones: Like mainstream, yeah, and it's like, yeah, told you so, you know, like.

Chris Gammell: Oh, that's what you're saying is off the top of your head, you just popped in your head that you wanted to say, told you so. Yeah, exactly. I feel like you're always on the verge of like wanting to say that.

Dave Jones: Because it's always true. You make these outlandish claims.

Chris Gammell: You're always right, yes. Dude, we've been doing it. No, because I think what that article is about.

Dave Jones: We're 300 episodes in and you still won't admit the chip printers are pie in the sky. I haven't talked about those in a long time, Dave. Exactly.

Chris Gammell: I won't admit it, but I will stop talking about it. Oh, dear, oh, dear, oh, dear.

Dave Jones: I don't know.

Chris Gammell: You know, that was about, I think they were talking about full automatic type stuff, right? But I think they were also talking about legislation type things as well.

Dave Jones: Oh, yeah, yeah, totally.

Chris Gammell: Which makes sense.

Dave Jones: No, yeah, because like people think that, oh, these, you know, just because they can make something, A, everyone's going to use it and B, everyone's going to be allowed to use it. No, the world's much more complex and anal than that. I'm sorry. Yeah.

Chris Gammell: Well, I mean, if you really think about, like.

Dave Jones: Like, you know, red tape and all that sort of stuff, you know.

Chris Gammell: I mean, it could also be that they're not ready for all the liability that comes along with it. I still don't know how. Like, because, I mean, you know it's going to come back to them eventually just because they make so much money. How does that even work eventually? Like, how does any car company not get sued like crazy, you know?

Dave Jones: Oh, well, regular liability laws. I mean, once you buy a product, I mean, as long as the product is not faulty, you know, I mean. But, well, okay, so you're talking about. You're saying insurance in general. Okay, you know, if it's. Well, okay, so you're talking about. You're hinting at a new problem here. A new liability problem for manufacturers. Because at the moment, my voice is going. All they do, right, they make a car. Okay, as long as it's, you know, it's reliable. They've been building reliable. Cars have been getting more and more, more and more reliable for like 100 years. Right? To the point where you buy a car and it's got a five-year warranty because they know it's not going to fail. Right? So as long as like the wheels don't fall off and it kills someone, then, you know, so they don't have to worry about that. But self-driving car technology, there is potentially so much that could go wrong. Right? So it raises new liability questions and the manufacturers may not even want to do it on a mass scale. Maybe. Unless perhaps you signed a, you know. Yeah, hold armless. Yeah, those never. Yeah, you know. There's some sort of agreement when you buy the car. You know, laws would have to change or you'd have to sign contracts, liability contracts.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, yeah. All that sort of jazz. Yeah.

Dave Jones: So that could, you know, I mean, that could kill the entire concept right there. I mean, they just may not happen.

Chris Gammell: I mean, I think in all this stuff, though, I think it'll do, I mean, like there are already, I mean, to be technical about it, there already are self-driving cars on the road.

Dave Jones: There are. And I'm surprised that they're allowed to do it, actually. I'm surprised that they're allowed to do it. Well... Are they doing it because there currently is no legislation and nothing stopping them? But I guarantee you, if I manufactured a remote-controlled car and I put it on the road, I'd be in serious trouble. You just said remote-controlled car.

Chris Gammell: You mean a self-driving car.

Dave Jones: Oh, well, you know, like a self-driving car. If I developed my own self-driving car and just put it on the road and went, well, Toyota's allowed to, why not me? Google's allowed to, why not me? You know, like they would, like, I'd, you know, I'd be up on charges quicker than anything. Yeah, I don't know.

Chris Gammell: I think if you go through the other stuff, though, I'm not sure how that works. Maybe it's just the legislation hasn't caught up yet, but...

Dave Jones: Right. Or maybe just because they've gotten lucky and nobody's been killed yet. But once somebody gets killed, you know, heads are going to roll.

Chris Gammell: I mean, yeah, I don't know. I don't know.

Dave Jones: So, hmm. But I do know it's going to be a big deal. Potentially the biggest deal. The tech may not be the problem.

Chris Gammell: Well, yeah, it'll come down to that.

Dave Jones: The biggest hurdle may be in the legal side of things, yeah? Yeah. Told you so.

Chris Gammell: Told you so. Yeah, I'm sure. Yes, you told me so. Yeah, right. Okay. Just because they said it's still 20 years off doesn't mean it won't come off sooner or it won't be, it might not be Google, right? I mean, like, I just saw a post today that was like, is this person sleeping while their Tesla's driving? It was a video of someone filmed the Tesla next to them. It looked like the person was sleeping.

Dave Jones: I can hear that. I can hear that video you're playing.

Chris Gammell: I'm not playing a video.

Dave Jones: Oh. Something happening at my end then. Something's happening at my end. Something's playing. I've got music in my, I've got an ad in my ears.

Chris Gammell: Dave's going senile too. Bloody hell. I just shut down all my tabs. See, this is why you gotta be careful with all the, yeah, opening too many tabs, man. You know, you know, in Chrome it shows a little speaker when it's playing something.

Dave Jones: Yeah, I know. I couldn't see it. It's still going. Where is it? Where the hell is it?

Chris Gammell: He's just going crazy.

Dave Jones: There it is. There it is. Oh, bloody. There we go. Shut it down. Yeah, got it. Oh, God, I'm not going crazy.

Chris Gammell: I'm already crazy. Yet. Oh, man, that's funny. Next. Dude, cities are so loud. Why are they so loud? Idiotic drivers.

Dave Jones: Because they're sheer volume of people.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. Doing stuff. I wonder if beeping will go down if self-driving cars, you know?

Dave Jones: Oh, right. Okay, there'd be no more honking, huh?

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: I don't know about, you know, U.S. cities all that much, but here, like you go in the city here, there isn't much honking going on. It's not like, you know, all the cab drivers go, you know? In China, it was like that. It was like foot to the floor, honk, honk, honk, honk, honk. Right, right. Like everyone did it. It was so noisy. But here, no.

Chris Gammell: Not too much.

Dave Jones: Not a problem.

Chris Gammell: Oh, yes. Aussies are known for their calm demeanor.

Dave Jones: They're right. Yeah, she'll be right. No worries. What's this crap about Indiegogo teaming up with Arrow? What's this about?

Chris Gammell: It's basically what it says.

Dave Jones: Yeah. In what way? Are they teaming up?

Chris Gammell: I mean, I think they said they're going to do like bomb checks and stuff like that. Like they're, you know, they're going to just make sure this, I don't know to what level. What do they call it though? They called it like Arrow will assess campaigns for their technical feasibility, manufacturability, and quote, is this a good idea in the first place or will it die the fiery death of crushed entrepreneur dreams ability?

Dave Jones: So it's a vetting thing? Is it a vetting thing?

Chris Gammell: Yeah, I think so. Yeah, I kind of thought it would, oh God, Solar Roadways.

Dave Jones: Oh, it has been. Oh, here's the quote. Solar Roadways was successful on Indiegogo and went on to deliver with Arrow's help. Oh, please shoot me now.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, I, uh, I wouldn't have done this if I was Arrow.

Dave Jones: No, no, and especially not Indiegogo, which is the scam essential of choice, you know, like for.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, I don't.

Dave Jones: It's a bad move, bad move.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, I just think it's, you know, they might lend some credibility to the future stuff, but I think, I think at least from my initial reaction, it's like, uh, that just makes Arrow look not great, you know, like. Yep, yep. So, you know, and we've talked about it before, like we want Indiegogo to do well. We want these crowdfunding platforms to do well.

Dave Jones: Oh, yeah, no, we want them to change. We want them to implement stuff like this. Right, right. So that is a good step. Where there's actually some sort of vetting, technical vetting. Right, um.

Chris Gammell: But, but hopefully, you know, it's going to remain to be seen too, right? It could just be like, oh, well, we're paired up. You know, okay.

Dave Jones: And if they're just going to check the bomb and, you know, it'll be, it could be false validation, right? Oh, yeah, Arrow have looked at, they're a huge, you know, parts supplier and engineering, you know, their expertise and whatever, blah, blah. You know, oh, it must be good. Yeah, and there's different levels too, right? It must be a valid concept, yeah.

Chris Gammell: It could be like, I mean, like, well, you think about it. But if I think about, I could, I could put a bomb together and it depends where, you know, anyone that's looking at it. It's like, if the bomb could be valid, it could be like, all these parts are sourceable, all of, you know, like stuff that we talk about a lot. Of course, yeah. It's like, is it sourceable? Are you going to get screwed on your shipping times? Is it stuff, you know, is, is the lead times normal? Well, however, if there's not someone like, hey guys, this doesn't work at all. This is, this is, this is a load of malarkey.

Dave Jones: It violates the laws of physics, you know? Yeah, right, right.

Chris Gammell: So, yeah, it's going to come down to where that happens. So, that's kind of going to be on Arrow. So, I know they, I mean, like, they have, they have a huge technical center in Denver. They have FAUs and stuff like that.

Dave Jones: Yeah, they've got very good applications engineers. Now, of course, who could smell bullshit a mile away, I'm sure. Whether or not they'll be allowed to go, well, this is just bullshit, you know.

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: Or whether or not that even tasks them to do that in the first place.

Speaker ?: Yeah.

Chris Gammell: So, yeah, I think, I think one way I would say it is, I am optimistic that they'll help on the technical side. But I am cynical that it was just a business deal where it's like, hey, let's pair up. So, we'll see. I mean, honestly, it's going to come down to, like, the first big one that gets funded, where this thing is implemented, it'll, you know, that'll, proof will be in the pudding of the chips and stuff, right?

Dave Jones: I still think there's a market out there for anyone who can, you know, like, offering a service validating projects. It's like, yeah, we've looked at this and it passes the bullshit test, you know.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. Like, I… Oh, you mean the actual, like, the physics and that kind of stuff. Yeah. I think you're talking about your blog, Dave.

Dave Jones: Right. And you can have a stamp of approval. You know, I've thought about this in the past, you know, a few years back. And, you know, I'm sure we've talked about this where, you know, I thought, oh, yeah, you know, there could be a service where you could pay to have an independent, you know, company certify your idea and concept and actually look at it and look at your prototype and go, right, you know, and go, yeah, this is feasible. Yes, there might be issues, you know, the usual manufacturing, you know, issues and things like that. But it's not a bullshit idea, you know, or it's not pie in the sky. It really does exist. It gets our stamp of approval. It doesn't mean it can't fail, right, just due to natural, you know, poor management or whatever. You know, that's a different story entirely.

Chris Gammell: You know what it would almost be like, if it wasn't a terrible example, you know what it would almost be like? It's like bond ratings. Now, obviously, that's a terrible example if you've seen the big short. Yes, I've seen the big short. Triple A bond ratings, you know. Yeah, exactly. Right. So, any kind of system can get corrupted, of course. But, you know, something like that, it doesn't have to be like yes or no, 100%, but it's just like levels of risk and stuff like that. Right.

Dave Jones: Yeah. Oh, dude, have you been following the, is it the peachy printer?

Chris Gammell: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, it's been for a while now.

Dave Jones: Oh, did you follow that?

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: Of what's happened recently?

Chris Gammell: Recently, more than the founder running off with a bunch of money?

Dave Jones: No, that's the one I'm talking about. Yeah. One of the founders just ran off with 300, well, no, he didn't run off. He just took it.

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: He just took it. And this is the most bizarre thing. And the other co-founder who runs it knew all about this and actually confronted him like a year ago and sat down with the camera and actually interviewed him about it, interviewed his co-founder about stealing the money. And the guy said, oh, yeah, I took it and I built a house with the money. You know, like, it's the most bizarre thing. And they've got these highly polished, highly produced YouTube videos that are like almost documentaries. Yeah, that's just really bizarre. It is the most bizarre thing I've ever seen. We've got to link it in. It is, like, it'll just blow your mind. So instead of...

Chris Gammell: They have, like, B-roll footage of them pushing little old ladies down and, like, stealing children's candy and... Oh, wow. But high-quality videos of that, huh?

Dave Jones: I just thought this has to be a joke. Like, they can't be serious. But, yeah, and apparently the one co-founder who made these videos is now attempting to sue the other co-founder or whatever. But the other... Like, just go and watch the video. Oh, my God. You'll be so... Like, you'll go, what the hell did I just watch? It's the weirdest thing I've ever seen in my life.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. It's weird.

Dave Jones: Anyway, yep, just ran off with the money. I mean, I don't, like...

Chris Gammell: R-U-N-N-O-F-T. R-U-N-E. What's it from? Oh, Brother Where Out, though? Yeah. Oh, no, I don't know that.

Dave Jones: But anyway, it's not okay. He ran off with the money. Fine. Right? But then to be... I'm confused. I'm confused. I'm very confused about the peachy printer.

Chris Gammell: Well, I think now what happens is that you and I do our semi-regular public service announcement that you're not buying a finished product. You're buying the trust of a bunch of people that really haven't proven that much other than making nice videos up front. But also, I have a theory...

Dave Jones: You haven't bought anything. What?

Chris Gammell: I have a theory that anything that has the cost of the thing that you're buying in the name is always a bad idea.

Dave Jones: Example?

Chris Gammell: The $100 printer.

Dave Jones: Oh, the $50 printer. Oh, yes, of course. Right.

Chris Gammell: The $300 pick-and-place.

Dave Jones: The world's first... Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. Now, I can hear some of you screaming already, but what about the world's first $35 computer? And that one might be the exception. But if you do recall, I maintained that skepticism up until it shipped, and I admitted I was wrong. And you might also say, what about the $9 chip? Right? And it's like, well, that's not really a $9 board. That's out, and it is, you know, like...

Dave Jones: No, and it doesn't have a video interface. It doesn't have, you know, like...

Chris Gammell: I mean... Yeah. Yeah, I mean, but the main thing being that, like, when you're using that for your marketing, it's like, ah... Yep, yep. I mean, even with the Raspberry Pi stuff, right? I mean, that's what we were talking about, if that wasn't clear. Like, it's $35, but I don't think... I don't know, but I don't think any of the vendors are making much margin. You know, like, I don't think...

Dave Jones: No, they make a bugger all.

Chris Gammell: Nobody's making money in that. And so, like, if it wasn't, like, supported, I just... Maybe I'm speaking out of my butt here, but I just don't think... Like, those are very special cases, and when you then mix in the commerce piece, like, hey, it's a $100 printer, but we're also going to make enough money to keep the business afloat and keep going, it's like, okay, but do you have a company behind you like Raspberry Pi does? You know, like, that's where it starts to fall apart. It's like, did anyone look at margins on this thing? Do you realize that if there's a mistake, you're already up a creek? You know, like, so...

Dave Jones: I just did a video on the $10 Raspberry Pi clone.

Chris Gammell: Oh, the orange versus raspberry. I saw that.

Dave Jones: The orange versus Raspberry Pi, and, you know, and... I got a fair bit of criticism over that, which, you know, not unexpected, of course. It's like, well, what the hell did you expect? It's only $10. Of course the drivers are going to be shit. Of course. Blah, blah, blah. You know, and...

Chris Gammell: Uh-huh. I haven't watched it yet. Could you summarize it?

Dave Jones: 30 seconds? A summarize is that it is not polished like the Raspberry Pi. Yes, it works, right? It's a $10 Raspberry Pi clone, and it's better bang per buck, better performance per watt, you know, everything, right? So it's... Technically, hardware is better than the Raspberry Pi. Oh, sure. Like, you get better bang per buck, right? But it's the support. It's the ecosystem. It's the... Right, right. You know, it's the driver builds. It was like... Yeah. You know, it was so dodgy. Like, it took me to some Chinese website that got flagged for downloading, you know, as a security threat. And it's just nothing worked. Everything was out of date. Like, you know, it was just...

Chris Gammell: Yeah, but you didn't... I think you were getting pinged because it's like you had that expectation that it would be exactly the same. But you didn't expect that, I'm sure.

Dave Jones: I didn't have any expectation. I simply got it because it was cheap because I wanted to buy a whole bunch of them. So it was like one third the cost of the Raspberry Pi, right? So I wanted to buy a whole bunch of them, put them in like a supercomputer cluster. So, you know, yeah, okay. And I didn't know what to expect. I simply got it, and I tried to start it up and did a video about, you know, the things that went wrong. So it's not nearly as polished as the Raspberry Pi, but it works. And a lot of people said, oh, what did you expect? It's bullshit, blah, blah, blah.

Chris Gammell: Oh, I see, I see.

Dave Jones: And, well, it doesn't have to be. It doesn't have to be. You can actually make cheap hardware and provide at least a half reasonable experience. You know, like just simply having all the builds available. Just having all the builds available. Like, that's not rocket science, right? You know, sure, you're not going to create a huge community to support, but, you know, just at least have the downloads available properly and done before you release the board kind of thing. You know? I don't know.

Chris Gammell: I think what you're touching on, too, is like, so, you know, we've talked about a lot on here that, you know, hardware people are, in the best case, cost optimizers in the worst case, miserly cheapskates like you and I are. Yeah, right. Yep. But I think what it really comes down to is, like, that's just the, you know, that's the, there is a point where, yes, you can get similar kind of hardware at a similar price point. You know, sometimes, you know, if you're buying a good product, they've already taken all the cost out, right?

Dave Jones: Not necessarily.

Chris Gammell: I think so.

Dave Jones: If you're buying a good product, they've already taken all the cost out, right?

Chris Gammell: I think if you're buying, if, so, say, say you're buying a relatively mature product. Right. That basically that, that taking the cost out is a competitive advantage, right? If they didn't do that, then someone else is going to do it for them. That's what, that's what I mean. And so, like, if there is a drastic price difference like that, right, that, you know, a third the cost, the way they're doing that is, like, you said it's better specs, but it's, it's a different, it's a completely different build, isn't it? I mean, like, it's a different target processor, stuff like that.

Dave Jones: It's a different target processor. It's the Allwinner A3 instead of the Broadcom processor, which is cheaper. And who knows where they got it from? It might be gray market, you know. No, I don't think so.

Chris Gammell: The Allwinner stuff is, is very, is very capable and very, I mean, there are tons of things.

Speaker ?: Oh, no, no, it's very capable.

Dave Jones: It's used in lots of, you know, lots of high end, you know.

Chris Gammell: But I think that, like, at a certain point, like, there is a cost reduction, like, threshold. And when you switch, when you switch processors, then you switch your entire software stack. Not the entire stack, obviously. But, you know, you're retargeting for a different processor. And that, that right there means that you're, yeah, you're losing, you're losing a lot of, you know, time, time equity that people have put into polishing up the software stack. Yeah, exactly. So, I think that's, that's just good. I mean, like, I don't know. I, I don't, I don't know if there is, I don't think there's, I, I think people should, you know, support the community, stuff like that. But, you know, if, if you're cost constrained, is it better to, like, what if, what if someone was going to, again, let's, let's move away from this one. Because I think the Broadcom example is not going to really work because it's hard to get those chips otherwise. But say, like, say, like the Arduino side of things, right? Some people choose to buy the Arduino, the normal stuff. And some people buy, you know, kind of the knockoff stuff. If, is it better for someone to not, that maybe can't afford the higher cost brand supported one, but then they go and write software that helps other people? It's like, I don't know. Like, where is that line? You know, there's, there's just a lot of gray in that area. You know, like, where is the responsibility?

Dave Jones: Well, that is a, that is a different, that is a different argument to the Raspberry Pi all winner. Raspberry Pi versus Orange. It's a different scenario because the Raspberry Pi is closed. It's not open hardware. You know, as you said, you can't buy those chips, whereas the other one you can. And it is open source. And, you know, it's open source hardware as opposed to Raspberry Pi, which is not open source hardware. Yeah, sure.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, that's a good point.

Dave Jones: You know, et cetera. And it uses an entirely different processor. So everyone goes, oh, it's a clone. No, it's not a clone. It's using an entirely different processor. How can it be a clone? Right.

Chris Gammell: It's just, it's just trying to match on specs, you know.

Dave Jones: And it's trying to match on the pinouts and stuff like that. And that's a good thing.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, and pinouts.

Dave Jones: Like, that is not, you know, if you want to clone the pinout, that's a good thing for the industry. It's not bad. You know, I don't want every single development board on the market to have a different bloody interface. You know?

Chris Gammell: Yeah, I agree with that, too. And I think if we ever get to the point where people are trying to protect their product based on the interface layer, like a pinout type of thing, then we're in much better. We're in much worse shape than we think.

Dave Jones: Right. Yep. Agreed.

Chris Gammell: Yeah, it sucks. No, I mean, that's good, though, that you try that thing. I just kind of wonder where people think that the, you know, that responsibility lies. I mean, there's, you know, I buy a lot of community stuff.

Dave Jones: Is there any responsibility? It's simply the way the market operates. I mean...

Chris Gammell: I don't think there's responsibility, but I think that some people choose to support the community, and that often pays them back. In terms of, you know, more reliable tutorials and, you know, the feel-goods of supporting companies that are doing good things. You know, like that, those are all very good things.

Dave Jones: In this case, it's different communities, so to speak. Because if you buy an Orange Pie, it's not like you can, you know, if you update the drivers and stuff, they're not going to work on the Raspberry Pi, right? Right, exactly. So you're not giving back to the Raspberry Pi community. You're giving back to the Orange Pie community. You know, it is a different thing. Whereas the Arduino example is different. You know, the Arduino will be an exact clone. So anything you do there helps the Arduino community. The genuine Arduino community.

Chris Gammell: I don't know. Yeah, whatever. Yeah. But, I mean, in that scenario, it's also not cost-optimized at all, right? Like, I mean, that's different in that regard as well. That, like, $30 for an Arduino is pretty high. Oh, yeah. Yeah, it's pricey. For a PCB with a 328 on it. Yeah. So, yeah. It's support your community. But if you can't, I would say, you know, I'd rather people have electronics in their hands and support in other ways than, you know. Support the brand. Support the software ecosystem. Support by teaching others with it. That kind of stuff.

Dave Jones: Yeah, exactly. Yes.

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: I think it's more important to, well, no, I'm not going to say that. No. No, I was going to say something potentially dumb there. That was more, I'll say it anyway. Because that's what I do.

Chris Gammell: Dave Jones, folks. I was going to say something dumb, but I'll say it anyways.

Dave Jones: More important to support the community than the company.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. Yeah, that's weird with hardware, right? It, it, uh.

Dave Jones: Yeah, it's, it's weird. I mean, you know, like.

Chris Gammell: Where does, where does one start and stop?

Dave Jones: Yeah. You know. Because the community can ultimately become bigger than the company. You know, and more important than the company.

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: So, yeah, I mean. It's tough. I don't know. Next. What else we got? Let's fill out the bingo sheet. Come on. Come on.

Chris Gammell: Oh, yeah. We were going to do that, weren't we? Someone's asking about book lists. I don't really have much book list on hand. I mean.

Dave Jones: No. I don't. Every, I get an email every week. Oh, what's the best book for beginners? It's like, what do you recommend? You know, like. And, no. Sorry. I mean.

Chris Gammell: The best book for beginners is. Two Minute Topics by Chris Gammell. Not really. I mean, it's. I know people like books. I'm so close.

Dave Jones: Whatever one works for you. Just go read different ones. And you'll like some over others. They'll make more sense. Yeah.

Chris Gammell: The hard part is finding a bookstore to go try it out. You know. Right. Or finding a bookstore that actually has enough books in it. Yeah. Mm. Libraries. Remember, folks. Libraries are there for a reason. And you can actually get. Yeah.

Dave Jones: Right. Do you see my mailbag? You probably didn't watch my entire mailbag. So, you probably didn't see it. No. Yeah. Sorry. No. I have got some 1924 vintage American Technical Society. The complete set of the. What's it? What's it called? Hang on.

Chris Gammell: IEEE.

Dave Jones: I've got. No.

Chris Gammell: He's looking for. Complete technical manuals for. Let's see. Building codes. Here we go. Electrical codes. What is it?

Dave Jones: The complete set of applied electricity. Yes. This was like. From the American Technical Society. This was like the standard electrical engineering set back in the 1920s. And they've got like some of the contributors. Tesla. You know. Like other. You know. Some really big names back in the day. You know. Like. So many people edited this thing. You only know one of the names.

Chris Gammell: Don't you? Yeah. Anyway.

Dave Jones: No. No. No. I've heard some of the others. And. Yeah. It's a big. Like. This was the thing. You know. It was like a 10 volume set. And. So. I've got the complete one from 19.

Chris Gammell: It's like. Having. Having all of the world's knowledge about electronics. The world's. Electronics. Yeah. Electrical. Right.

Dave Jones: Electrical knowledge. The world's electrical knowledge. All in one. Yes. It is a. A cyclopedia. Not any. None of this modern encyclopedia rubbish. It's a cyclopedia. It's called.

Chris Gammell: What's. What's the etymology of the cyclopedia word? I don't know. I don't know. It doesn't encapsulate all knowledge. It's.

Dave Jones: I like it. It's just. Yeah. That is cool. I like it. Yeah. It's a cyclopedia of applied electricity. And. Hmm. Yes. It's wonderful. So I've got the set from 1924 and 1942 as well.

Chris Gammell: Nice.

Dave Jones: So. Yeah. It's just beautiful. And all the hand drawings in there. And. Like. You know. Fantastic.

Chris Gammell: Oh. What was. 1924. I mean. Like. That was. Obviously no semiconductors. We know that. You know. Valves. Was there tubes then? Yeah. I mean. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Tubes. Tubes were there. But it was early. Early days.

Dave Jones: It was early days. Yep.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. Radio was invented by then. Right. Oh yeah. Of course. Discovered. I suppose. But. But it was probably all AM at that point. I don't really know. I don't know the history of. That. Like when.

Dave Jones: I don't. Yeah. I couldn't tell you offhand. But. But anyway. It's the general reference work.

Chris Gammell: It'd be nice to have like a. Like a. Like a timeline. Of when things happen. I bet there is.

Dave Jones: Oh. I'm sure there is. Yeah.

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: But it's a general reference work on electrical principles. Wiring. Primary and storage batteries. Meters. Switchboards. Electromagnets and coils. AC and DC machinery. Starters. Controllers. Armature windings. Household appliances. Electric refrigeration. Industrial electronics. Tubes. Tubes. Um. Uh. Radio essentials. Public address systems. Televisions. Transformers. Transmissions. Distribution systems. Hydroelectric plants. Diesel electric pumps. Electric welding. And how to read electrical blueprints. It's all in there.

Chris Gammell: Wow. That's cool. Yeah. That is cool. Yeah. Are you going to do like a review on it you think?

Dave Jones: Oh yeah. It's beautiful. Dig through. Yes.

Chris Gammell: You know that'll be good for when you're laid up with your knee surgery. You can just kind of. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. I can just. Yep. And now Dave reads from an old book. So I just found there is. There is a timeline here on Wikipedia. Oh. There is. Okay. 25. Uh. Austrian engineer. Austrian American engineer patented the first FET which wasn't used until much later. Right. I suppose just capacitor plus opening up channels kind of things. Uh. AM radio receivers 1919. Multi vibrator 1918. Crystal oscillator 1917. Uh. Discover develop. 1912 was the oscillator. Man. That's crazy. Even thinking about like days before the oscillator. Yeah. I know. So.

Dave Jones: Wow.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. I don't think I would have made it back then. Yeah. You ever think about what you would have done if you were like born? A hundred years earlier.

Dave Jones: Oh man. Yep.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. I would have been like that.

Dave Jones: The triode was invented in 1907.

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: No. There. There you go. The thermionic valve. The first thermionic valve was 1904.

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: So. I mean that was. Yeah.

Chris Gammell: I mean like a lot of that stuff. I mean they did spark gap stuff earlier but. Right. But. Forrest and lamp. Jeez. Crazy. Anyways. I'll link that in as well. What are we working on these days? You. I saw you doing a layout. On your secondary channel.

Dave Jones: No. That's old. That's some old. That is old. Which I just uploaded. Because I haven't. I haven't had a voice this week. So I haven't been able to do any videos. So I just thought. Oh I've had this video hanging around for a few years. I'll just upload it.

Chris Gammell: Hmm.

Dave Jones: I was going to add some commentary over the top. And things like that. But I've done a video like that before. I've done like a. You know. Like a six hour layout. Sped up. With commentary over the top. Explaining how I lay out the board. And things like that.

Chris Gammell: So.

Dave Jones: I was going to do that again. But yeah. I'm not doing too well.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. Yeah. You sound. Okay enough.

Dave Jones: Okay enough.

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: All right. That's it.

Chris Gammell: How we doing on. That's it. Shows up. Oh actually. Shows up. Yeah. I did want to call out. There was a cool video about SCRs. That we'll link in as well. From the current source. New. New. New. Competition for you Dave.

Dave Jones: Oh the current source. I do tell. I haven't heard of it.

Chris Gammell: It's just a new. New YouTube channel. So. Talking about how. How to build up a. SCR.

Dave Jones: Do we have details?

Chris Gammell: No. No. No. Just like the. The physics behind it. Like the.

Dave Jones: Yeah. But no. Who's running the channel? I want to know.

Chris Gammell: Oh.

Dave Jones: Is it called the current source? I don't see it.

Chris Gammell: It's called the current source. Yeah.

Dave Jones: Oh no. I typed it wrong. Silly me. I typed it wrong a second time. I'm an engineer. I can't.

Chris Gammell: Spell. Yep. Yep. Anyways. That's definitely worth checking out. We would just be repeating stuff on here anyways.

Dave Jones: Right.

Chris Gammell: Anything else on here? No. I think we've.

Dave Jones: Dude. You're behind the time. Started seven months ago.

Chris Gammell: Well I know that. But. I just mean that. You know. This is a good video too. So. This is a recent one. Okay. I will reiterate. So we're going to be. We. I will be hosting a meetup in Denver. At. And if you. Dave. I don't know if you saw on the site. But there's a picture I made. We will be at the Black Sky Brewery in Denver. Which is near the Den Hack. Which is the hackerspace nearby. Not super close. But you know. Close enough. That'll be Sunday. May 29th. May 29th. At 4pm. So if you're in Denver. Would love to hang out. Bring a project to show. I will have my. Blinky heart with me probably. Because that's all I brought on the road. Yeah. Right.

Dave Jones: Sweet.

Chris Gammell: Yeah.

Dave Jones: All right.

Chris Gammell: And one of these days. What a bunch of funsters. Dave will. Come over for a meetup too. I'm sure. One of these days. Maybe. One of these days. One of these days. All right man. Well hey. Here's to the next. God. 300 shows. You know. The next 300. If we get to 600. That'll be like. 10 years worth of shows. We're already.

Dave Jones: Oh that's insane.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. No. We're pushing 6 years already. Aren't we?

Dave Jones: I think we could be pushing 6 years. Yeah.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. In August. Because we started August of 2010. So.

Dave Jones: Wow.

Chris Gammell: Yeah. Crazy.

Dave Jones: Scary. All right. All right man. See you next time.

Chris Gammell: Talk to you soon.

Speaker ?: We'll see you next time.