The Amp Hour Electronics Podcast

Dr Greg Charvat, CTO and co-founder of Teradar, joins Chris for a 5th appearance on The Amp Hour to talk about how terahertz frequency radar will revolutionize the automotive space and far outstrips the capabilities of LIDAR and Blobbology

Alex Haro, CEO of Hubble, joins Chris to talk about building a network of terrestrial and space (!) based Bluetooth infrastructure to track low power devices across the globe, without a data plan or a GPS module onboard.

Dave and Chris discuss a massive “boat anchor” warehouse clearance, 0201 board assembly, Texas Instruments’ stealthy datasheet updates for classic op-amps, the latest in local AI models, and paper-based electronics art

Massimo Banzi is co-founder of Arduino, the worldwide project built upon easily accessible embedded hardware. He joins Chris to talk about the design, rise, struggles, and eventual exit of the company, and what he’s now doing with Supermoderno.

Michał Zalewski (lcamtuf) is a security researcher, author, electronics enthusiast, and calculator collector. He joins Chris to talk about his new book The Secret Life of Circuits and his interest in the field of electronics and explaining things to others.

Dave and Chris discuss the infrastructure and massive energy demands of AI data centers, injecting power through a programming header, Linux changes, and dogfooding your own projects.

Jason Kridner returns to The Amp Hour after his first appearance 15 years ago to talk about the BeagleBadge and Zepto boards that showcase new capabilities in the Linux and Zephyr space. The BeagleBoard.org project is still focused on building open source, affordable, and accessible Linux and embedded hardware.

Matt Venn returns to The Amp Hour to talk about the successes (and learnings) from many additional runs of TinyTapeout, a shared project service sitting on top of a multi product wafer service. Matt also talks about a forthcoming analog ASIC design class on Zero to Asic, his online course.

Dave and Chris talk about the letdown of signing an NDA and seeing “behind the curtain”. Also inverters, programming tools, pricing changes at Altium, and old school web stuff.

Chris joins the Circuit Break podcast (Parker Dillman, Stephen Kraig) along with James Lewis to talk about engineering careers. This show will also be posted as episode 435 of the Circuit Break Podcast

Petr Dvorak is a freelance PCB designer and a prolific sharer of knowledge on LInkedIn. He joins Chris to discuss electronic microscopes, traveling to Shenzhen, revision control, KiCad (of course), and much more!

Chris and Dave discuss controlled impedance board traces, classic hacker movies, Location APIs, CHIPS act beneficiaries, power problems in houses, and more!

CNLohr returns to The Amp Hour to talk about LoRa and implementing a solution using harmonics coming out of a standard microcontroller’s GPIO

This week Chris and Dave discuss EV charging, chip fabs, manufacturing, large airliners, power storage, and more!

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.