Kits vs ready-made (was RE: Rebirth of IMSAI) - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

31 Mar 1999

take a look below, please.

Dick

-----Original Message-----
From: Tony Duell &lt;ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk&gt;
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
&lt;classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu&gt;
Date: Wednesday, March 31, 1999 5:40 PM
Subject: Re: Kits vs ready-made (was RE: Rebirth of IMSAI)

...
 >
> Unfortunately, in today's climate ("NOTHING's MY fault!") people
buy a kit
...

Yes, that attitude is _very_ annoying....

> A degree in engineering isn't sufficient qualification, either.  Some of
the
...
   crappiest work
I ever saw while in the aerospace industry, was by fairly 
Oh, don't get me started on that. I have no engineering qualifications at
all, but, even if I say so myself, I could out-design, out-construct, and
plain out-hack a number of people with degrees in engineering that I met...

A few classic cases that spring to mind :

One chap said 'There are no 362.8 Ohm resistors in the box'. I said I
wasn't supprised and asked him what on earth he wanted it for. The
answer : An LED current limiting resistor. That was the value that the
formula had given, so that was obviously the value he needed.

Another person had problems with a simple RC low-pass filter. And he
certainly had no idea about making sensible approximations.

The only problem that comes from this is that mangement-droids seem to
think that qualifications imply competence/knowledge. So I'm stuck unable
to get a job :-(

> senior engineers.  The excuse was that "it's not a deliverable,"  but
often
...
   the shoddy
technique (air-wires, etc) made for problems which couldn't 
If that's another name for dead-bugging, there's nothing wrong with it if
used correctly. In fact IMHO it's the _only_ way to prototype
high-frequency circuits with any sort of reliability 

I have used dead-bug patches quite a few times myself.  More specifically,
dead-bugging is typically gluing or taping an IC onto another's back and
running wires between it and the appropriate points in the circuit.  I don't
mean that, so much, but using multiple feet of #40 magnet wire with the
shellac sanded or scraped off and having the scabbed-in IC floating on a web
of wires 3" above the board . . . ???

...
 And if you trust simulations to correclty predict the
behaviour of even
simple circuits, well, have I got some storys to tell you...
 Yes,  I have a few, too, but . . . Careful now . . . I've spend thousands of
hours in front of a big tube waiting for a simulation.  I am a big believer,
and believe further, that anyone who claims that simulators don't have a
place, as some old-timers do, just hasn't investigated sufficiently.
...

-tony