Setting Up Your EVE Display: A Quick Guide

Have you just purchased one of our Embedded Video Engine (EVE) displays and are wondering how to get up and running? This blog post aims to help users get started with their newly received EVE displays from setting up the hardware to running various demos. Before we jump in, if you have not already, take a moment to read our blog post on FTDI/Bridgetek Embedded Video Engine (EVE) Modules to get an idea of the various functionalities that the EVE makes possible and what makes them so great!

This section outlines how users need to interface an EVE...

Music in the browser or app?

At some point, your inspirational idea for digital music will have to travel from the platonic realm of your thoughts, into either an app or browser. Unless you can luxuriate in doing both, this represents a stark choice.

The post Music in the browser or app? appeared first on Music Hackspace.

Gradual migration of IP address/port between servers

I'm a strong proponent of self-hosting all your services, if not on your own hardware than at least on dedicated rented hardware. For IT nerds of my generation, this has been the norm sicne the early 1990s: If you wante to run your own webserver/mailserver/... back then, the only way was to self-host.

So over the last 30 years, I've always been running a fleet of machines, some my own hardware colocated, and during the past ~18 years also some rented dedicated "root servers". They run a plethora of services for either my personal stuff (like this blog, or my personal email server),...

Wuthering Bytes and OSHCamp Dates Confirmed, as the Call for Participation Opens

The dates for this year’s Wuthering Bytes festival and the Open Source Hardware Camp (OSHCamp) have been announced, with a call for participation now open.

This year the Wuthering Bytes festival will be taking place in Hebden Bridge from Friday the 23rd to Saturday the 31st of August inclusive – staring with the popular Festival Day on the Friday and then expanding to host additional events throughout the weekend.

These events include, as always, the Open Source Hardware Camp (OSHCamp), which will be taking place on the Saturday and Sunday as part of the wider festival schedule. The call for participation in...

Inside an unusual 7400-series chip implemented with a gate array

When I look inside a chip from the popular 7400 series, I know what to expect: a fairly simple die, implemented in a straightforward, cost-effective way. However, when I looked inside a military-grade chip built by Integrated Device Technology (IDT)4 I found a very unexpected layout: over 1500 transistors in an orderly matrix. Even stranger, most of the die is wasted: less than 20% of these transistors are used, forming scattered circuits connected by thin metal wires.

In this blog post, I look at this chip in detail, describe its gates, and explain how it implements the "1-of-4" decoder function. I also discuss why it sometimes...

iOmega JAZ. Жёсткие диски со сменными блинами

Приветствую всех!
Думаю, даже для далёких от темы компьютеров хорошо известно, что вскрытие обычного жёсткого диска приведёт к стопроцентной его порче. Но, как оказалось, для некоторых носителей есть исключения. Более того, существовали не просто «разборные» HDD, а такие, для которых извлечение блинов и повторная их установка были штатной операцией. Как же такое было возможно? Давайте разбираться.
Итак, в сегодняшней статье поговорим про iOmega JAZ, поистине интересный накопитель, совмещающий в себе свойства сразу нескольких компьютерных носителей. Узнаем, как устроены и как работают такие девайсы. Традиционно будет много интересного.
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KLayout and the Sky130 PDK

KLayout and Sky130: Inverter

I have created a small example of how to use KLayout for the layout of a simple inverter and run DRC and LVS for Sky130 in the hopes that it helps others on a similar journey.

You can find the repository with all files and a description in the klayout-sky130-inverter repository.

There are still some issues with the KLayout technology files so make sure to read the workarounds!

Good Luck 😉️

The Intel 8088 processor's instruction prefetch circuitry: a look inside

In 1979, Intel introduced the 8088 microprocessor, a variant of the 16-bit 8086 processor. IBM's decision to use the 8088 processor in the IBM PC (1981) was a critical point in computer history, leading to the dominance of the x86 architecture that continues to the present.1 One way that the 8086 and 8088 increased performance was by prefetching: the processor fetches instructions from memory before they are needed, so the processor can execute them without waiting on the relatively slow memory. I've been reverse-engineering the 8088 from die photos and this blog post discusses what I've uncovered about the prefetch circuitry.

The die photo below shows the 8088...

Уходящий в историю стандарт. Запускаем базовую станцию 3G (UMTS)

Приветствую всех!
2023 год стал началом массового отключения ныне уже устаревших сетей третьего поколения. Многие операторы по всему миру уже вывели из эксплуатации эти сети или запланировали это на ближайшие годы. Самое время для того, чтобы поднять такую базовую станцию у себя. И, как выяснилось в процессе, это не так просто, как может показаться.
Итак, в сегодняшней статье разберёмся с тем, как собрать и заставить работать софт для поднятия сотовой сети типа UMTS. Узнаем, как устроены и работают такие сети. Традиционно будет много интересного.
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March Update: Making waves

Long awaited community update is here! Introducing PineVox and bone conduction headset (help us find a name!), IronOS progress, PineNote insights, and PineTime news! We also cover cluster failure, state of services, and the future of the community updates. See you in the upcoming Q&A!