KonnectorPanik

Oct 27, 2019 · 1 hr 7 min · Episode 464 · 56.9 MB

0:00-1:07:22

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Chris has been making antennas on a mill and measuring them on a VNA.
Past guests Pete Bevelacqua and Jeff Keyzer offered their help about the
Hardie Pienaar was nice enough to simulate the antenna Chris cut to show what it should look like. It matched the reality well (this is the cover image for the episode).
Alan Wolke made a great video about how to use Smith Charts
Chris had to buy a bunch of n-type connectors, leading to a term he called "KonnectorPanik"
Apple is moving some of its manufacturing out of China
Looking up the term "student destinations" for different schools shows where students go on to work and how much they make. We looked at Carnegie Mellon's recent reporting.
We heard about Kong.cash from Paul Gerhardt. It's a "physical cryptocurrency" based upon the Etherium blockchain (Chris edit: trying to hold it together to get to the good parts here).
There is a flex PCB with UV printing and on-board security chip that allows users to validate transactions. The ATECC608A holds private keys, and enables a bunch of internet connecte devices these days.
"The chips are a keypair that identify the bill to an escrow contract. That contract holds a value timelocked for 3 years. You can check that the value is still there via NFC and even interface to it via the electrical connectors."
Dave did a (non-crypto) wallet review
Dave also did a teardown of (not just) a millivoltmeter. The hinged design and metal cans over each section were beautiful.
Dual display AC millivoltmeters
OnShape bought by PTC
Openscad, a project started by past guest Clifford Wolf
Flash memory is bricking Teslas
Someone posted about a "chip printer" on Kickstarter. What the heck is an n-type filament?
There's a $5 FPGA board coming to Seeed studio (h/t to Frank Buss) based upon the Gowin FPGA from Alcom