EP#430: The Toilet Mountain of Social Media

Episode Transcript
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Parker Dillmann (00:10):
Welcome to circuit break, a podcast from
MacroFab, a weekly show aboutall things engineering, DIY
projects, manufacturing,industry news, and EDA tool
pricing. We're your hosts,electrical engineers, Parker
Dillmann.

Stephen Kraig (00:24):
And Stephen Kraig.

This is episode 430. And so we got a new blog
post that I helped write. It'sprevent prototype delays, your
essential PCBA preorderchecklist. And this is just a
list. I I would assume most ofthe engineers that are listening
to our podcast know a lot ofthese tips and tricks, but this

(00:47):
is for, like, new people to theindustry and new people to PCBA
design.
So give it a listen, or a Iguess I haven't listened a, read
through. It goes through, like,verifying parts of component
selection, layout verification,that kind of stuff. Everything
that you

It's like a it's a primer on how to do it all.
Exactly. Yeah.

So, yeah, give it a a read. It's on
maccraft.com/blog. We'll put alink in the show notes. So, and
before we get into the EDA toolpricing topic, we have some
industry news. The, part of theCHIPS Act, that's the what was

(01:32):
it?
$280,000,000,000 that we'regonna spend over, I think, 5
years here in the US on chipindustry. 285,000,000 of that is
going to what's called digitaltwin chips research, which I
thought was I've never heard ofthat term before. Have you ever
heard of digital twin?

I I have not. What does that what does that
even mean?

I from glancing through the article, it's about
simulation of semiconductors.And they just call Oh, okay. The
marketing term is called digitaltwin.

The wanky term to just indicate that you're you're
simulating the thing before youmake it.

Yeah. Before you make it. And so they're
putting a lot of money into the,not just manufacturing the
chips, but the whole ecosystemaround it. Because you need
tools and design software tobuild chips, so they're
investing into that that side ofit as well.

Oh, that's cool. Yeah. I was that I don't recall
that being part of the original.I wonder if that got earmarked
on or or tacked onto it. It's,oh, well, we also have to
simulate these things.
Yeah. The Or or or maybe they'rejust allocating money that is
already part of the pot to dothis.

Well, it's called, like, the Chips and
Science Act is what it's callednow.

Oh.

So they had to add in science.

Wait. Wait. Wait. Did they retroactively go and
change the name?

I think so.

Because I thought it was just always called
straight up the Chips Act.

Me too. But this is a I have a URL here from
white house dot gov. That's thefact sheet on the CHIPS and
Science Act. So what'sinteresting though was I saw
some comments on this articleabout the costs. It's
$285,000,000, which is that'sthat's a lot of money.

(03:26):
Right? Yeah. I'm never evergonna see that much money.
You're never gonna see that muchmoney. Probably everyone
combined that listens to thispodcast, total combined is not
ever going to see that muchmoney total.

I can't even count to that number.

We'll start counting now. See what you get
to by the end of the podcast.And so I just have some
interesting things to throw out.This is what this is what people
complain about online,specifically, like Twitter and
Reddit, of how much stuff costs.So the chips act is

(04:03):
280,000,000,000 over probably 5ish years.
They don't actually say what thelength of the time it's gonna
be, but they're spending it atabout 56,000,000,000 a year, so
5 ish years. One of the big onesthat's more recently in news is
Boeing's Starliner, the thecapsule that's supposed to go to

(04:23):
the moon. Right? And it'ssupposed to take astronauts to
the International Space Stationand that kind of stuff. They
were and this is a fresh momentbecause I read an article about,
like, why the Starliner is itbasically failed at Boeing
because it's a how it works is acomplete it's a fixed price
instead of a, what would theycall that?

(04:45):
Where they can just build agovernment for whatever it
costs? There's a specific termfor that.

There's a term for that? I don't I don't know.
Yeah. I'm not sure I'm aware ofthat term. I don't think the
government typically doesn'tjust let you spend any amount of
money.

Boeing can.

When you're the size of Boeing, they're just,
like, whatever. Just send us thebill.

Yeah. What is that called? I have to find the
article I was reading aboutabout it. But, like, when they
do development, like, they givean estimate, and if it runs
over, they just charge thegovernment, and the government
just pays it. But this wassupposed to be a fixed price, so
they were given 4,200,000,000 todevelop this and produce the the

(05:29):
capsule, basically.

Yeah. Yeah. Is it FFP firm thick firm fixed price?

Yes. Yeah. And but that's only 0.4000000000 a
year. So apparently, Boeing lostmoney is the big thing over on
this. They're like a1,000,000,000 over, and they
have to eat at this time.
Whereas if they were developedif they were, like, Lockheed and
they had the other kind ofnormal defense contract where
with the f 35, which is also thereally famous, highly overrun

(05:59):
budgeted government program.They spent 400,000,000,000 since
95, but that's that only only inquotes comes out to
13,300,000,000 a year, which inthe grand scheme

That's a ton of money.

It's a ton of money, but we've given Ukraine
37,000,000,000 a year. I thinkwe're at 74 point something
billion now to Ukraine. So whenyou start complaining about the
f 35 or Starliner or Really theone that really stands out is
the Chips Act, which is$56,000,000,000 a year, which is

(06:39):
swamps. The other ones combinedis under that total. So, yeah,
that's it's it's start adding upwhat other stuff costs and
seeing I guess I guess theargument is if you were against
all this stuff.

Well well okay. But you can be you can be for
the results, but against theexecution. If some of the
opposition to the Chips Act wasjust the idea that it
effectively works as a blankcheck where, you know, it it was
less itemized unless We weren'tvoting necessarily on specifics

(07:14):
of what the bill was doing. Itwas just this omnibus. Here's a
ton of money.
Go do some stuff. And I know I'mI'm greatly

No. No. You're right. Simplifies. They
allocated but that would Yeah.
They allocated a whole bunch ofmoney, and then they had a
committee that would would spendit over the time.

Correct. Correct. Correct. And and and that's
where the blank check idea camein where it's just, okay. We
have Yeah.
This huge amount of money. Howdo we actually ensure that it
gets spent on the correct thing?So like I said, the opposition,
I don't think I I I doubtthere's few people or I I doubt
there's many people out therethat that would be against
bringing these kinds of jobs toAmerica or this kind of

(07:54):
technology to America. It's justthe the execution is almost
always where people disagreeabout it.

Oh, I 100% agree. It's kind of it's it's
when you look at it, it's likehow would you even structure say
you wanted to make it aspreadsheet. So the bill was a
spreadsheet that you had to passfor the for the

It just says it has one cell just has
280,000,000,000 up at the top.And then all the cells beneath
us, how do we spend this?

Yeah. So that that's the how do we spend this?
Like, how would you even golike, how much would you have to
pay to actually because you'dhave to basically pay the
committee to figure this out of,like, how to itemize it and how
much money it would actuallytake. Because I bet you we are

(08:45):
going to end up spending morethan the 280,000,000,000 to
bring all this all this kind ofmanufacturing back.

Well, actually, I'm I'm I'm curious, though. The
the okay. The the end result ofthe CHIPS Act is not the same as
let's build the Hoover Dam orlet's go do this other big
program where there's a clearlydefined we're done once the dam
is functional. Right? With theCHIPS Act, we're subsidizing and
and giving money to to thesethese facilities effectively to

(09:18):
get online.
But did we cook in all of theend cases where okay. The Chips
Act is complete when whathappens. Right. I don't I don't
know. And that's that's, again,that's more of the blank check
mentality where it's just, oh,we we give money, but what's the
end result?
What is the completion criteria,in other words?

When the spreadsheet hits 0.

But but but that's the whole but but but you
said, you know, you you expectmaybe we'll overrun, but, like,
how can you overrun if there'sno end case? Like, you just have
an amount of money, and then youspend it. And if they're done,
they're done. And if they'renot, they're not. Right?
Yeah. I don't know exactly howsomething like this pans out

(10:02):
because this is just I I I wouldexpect that if you were a
recipient of this money, youwould have to somehow prove that
you've spent the money andaccomplish what you're going
for, but that's not necessarilysomething that we're privy to.

Yeah. I'm looking to see what that kind of
contract because fixed pricecontract is what Boeing lost all
that money on Starliner. Oh,cost plus contracts. That's what
that's what they are Boeing isused to or in, like, Lockheed
and all those other ginormouscorporations that just get to

(10:41):
have lots of money.

I I don't know. That's one of the hardest things
I've I've done in my career iswork on contracts, which I
haven't done a ton of. But justfiguring out there's a dance
that business guys do. This thisthis dance where they're where
they're they're they're craftinglanguage in these contracts to
win things without lying andwithout falsifying information.

(11:09):
And and that's always beenreally difficult for me because
I I tend to be a very honestperson.
And so whenever I've worked inthese kinds of situations with
with contracts, I've I've hadpeople, like, take some of my
work and be like, I need torewrite half of this because
you're just telling too much inin this. I'm like, but I'm
telling the truth, and they'relike, yeah. But that won't win

(11:31):
us the contract. So I don'tknow. Like, I there there's
something a little bit kindalike it's it's like on the edge
of slimy and gross that I don'twant to be a part of.
Some people are just fantasticat that, though. They love that
chase, and they love figuringout how to how to make that
happen. I'm just when someonecomes up to me, they'd be like,

(11:51):
how long will this project take?I'll, you know, I'll be honest
and be like, oh, that soundslike a year and a half, and
they're like, can you do it in 6months? And I'm like, no.
Okay. Well, we'll tell you we'lltell the customer we'll do it in
6 months then. They're like, Idon't know.

So the Hoover Dam for adjusted for inflation
was 760,000,000. So quite a bitof money, actually.

760,000,000? Yes. But that pales in comparison to
280,000,000,000. That's true.It's 12 180th.
Right. Right. Right. I think Idon't know. Who owns the Hoover
Dam?

I'm hoping someone named Hoover. It's a
joke. Bureau of Reclamation. AUS department.

Okay. See, that that that feels more like the
classic idea of the governmentinvesting in itself in a way.
It's like, people need jobs,throw a bunch of money. Like,
the the like, the the classicidea of dig a hole and then pay
someone to fill it in eventhough the end result was we got
a, we got something out of thethe act or out of the the

(13:05):
investment. Whereas the CHIPSAct is taxpayer money funneled
to corporations to bring jobshere.

Mhmm. Yeah. That's I don't wanna go too much
into it, I guess, but if if youlisten to our talk with oh, what
was his name? It was about CCBAAAct.

Yeah. Right. Right. Right. Which that's
trying to get tacked onto theCHIPS Act as well.

I think it got passed. Did it?

Did it? Well, when we

were talking, it had not. I'm checking right
now. That was with David. Thatwas episode 388. When was that?
Summer last year. I mentioned,basically so if everyone
probably knows I'm a libertarianand taxation is a big thing I
always talk about with with withregards with the government. But

(13:58):
on that podcast, I basicallysaid, if if we're spending money
on, you know, tax money going topeople and infrastructure and
stuff that everyone here inAmerica uses, I'm generally okay
with that because I see thatthat's actually something
useful. Public education. Thatbecause in Texas, we pay a lot
in property taxes, because wedon't have a state income tax,

(14:19):
and those property taxes godirectly to the schools.
That's what that money is for.So I'm okay with that. That's
public I went through the publiceducation system. It's just me
giving back for the nextgeneration. Right?
But it's when when a big oldblank check gets signed or money
goes overseas to some, you know,war effort or something like

(14:40):
that. It's it's really hard forme to justify being excited
about my tax advice money goingthere.

Well and and and the thing about that is you have
to you have to justify what theend result of the money is. It
can't just be a blank check.There has to be it's not like
I'm not trying to make it soundtransactional, but there has to
be a reason for you giving thatthat money to someone else. And
aid is one of those, but,typically, it extends far beyond

(15:13):
aid. So, obviously, you you'rereferencing the, the situation
in Ukraine.
And and what? You said we hadalready spent $74,000,000,000 in
2 years on that on that effort.You know, what are the results
of that? What what is I'm not Idon't wanna make it sound like
what does America get out ofthat. But yeah.

(15:34):
Sure. What are the results of usspending that much money? Is it
is it purely to prevent aparticular outcome, or is there
more to it? And the answer, Ithink, is always there's way
more to it than that. So I don'tknow.
That that one's actually thatone's really polarizing. It's

(15:55):
and and and the thing about itis it's polarizing in so many
ways that I that that have beenthat they don't feel like they
fit in one particular aisle orthe other in terms of politics,
because you can find people onboth sides that are just
extremely you must support oryou must not support this
particular thing. It feels somuch more black and white than a

(16:16):
lot of our other stickysituations that we get into.

Yeah. It's especially because a lot of it
is down to social media too,making stuff way more
polarizing. When you only havehow many characters do you get
in Twitter? A 120 something?

Oh, I think they upped it a few years back. Oh,
yeah? But yeah. It was a 128,but then I think they bumped it
up to twice that

or more. 280 characters. Yeah. But it's still
not a lot.

No. It's it's it's not. Right? It's yeah. How
do you have, like, how do youhave actual discussions about
this when you're just yelling atsomeone in 280

characters? Exactly.

To Twitter oh, I'm sorry. X is is it's okay.
It's okay to call Twitter here.Okay. It's it's I don't know.
I think I I would not besurprised if, you know, a 100
years down the road, thehumanity finds out that Twitter
was not good for the humanpsyche. You know? Or, like,

(17:16):
that's not like, I say, it's notlike a good way for us to
communicate even though it seemslike a good way for us to

Yeah. And I I use Twitter as my only social
media, and I think it's becauseit's how easy it is, and I do
keep in contact with a lot ofother engineers on it. But I
found I if I found a coupleDiscord communities I really
like, and I find I use thosemore than, let's say, Twitter.

(17:42):
But, honestly, I've been tryingto navigate back to actual old
school forms. Circuit breakhyphen or was it circuit hyphen
break dotmaccred.com?form.maccred.com?

Let's just go with forum dot maccred.com. That
one's that one's the easiest.

Yeah. And trying to because now you can
actually have proper discoursewith people, and it's so much
more nicer.

Yeah. It also may be that you're getting older and
and that's what you crave.Right? Long form discourse where
you're willing to actually spendtime as opposed to just putting
whatever platitudes up on x orjust screaming about whatever
you're passionate about aboutthe moment, you know, and then,
you know

I think the most angry I've ever gotten,

pot on that one.

That's for sure. I I I definitely refuse to
talk about politics a lot. Sobecause I think that's

I think that's actually really healthy on the
x. Just just avoid it. It did100%. What what what kind of
good is gonna come from that?

Yeah. It's it's the It was a couple years ago.
Learning that you will neverchange someone's mind on the
Internet, especially on socialmedia. You'll never change
anyone's mind on the Internet.Completely change change and and
and also knowing half the peopleout there are just AI bots.
Maybe not even AI, there's bots.

Is Yeah.

Take that to heart and then everything your
blood pressure goes down. Stopworrying about stuff. What
people say on social mediadoesn't matter.

And and and it's funny because you can you can
pour your heart and soul intoexplaining your position in

In 240

characters. In 240 characters, but but even
that is like a like a a featwhere where you appropriately
get your point across and youyou give good information. And
then the very next post is justa shit poster that just throws
something some some garbagethere, and it just completely
deflates everything you justsaid.

Yeah. The the amount of bad faith actors, I
think a lot of

them are bots too. Just shitposting bots?

Yeah. Well, just bad faith bad faith
arguments and that kind ofstuff. Yeah. Like, whenever
whenever I see someone postsomething about America bad,
it's just America is bad becauseof this. I'm like, that's a bot.
Blah it. Blah it. Blah thatperson.

I mean, why would why wouldn't someone even
program a bot to do that,though?

There's there's actually funny you say that.
There's actually huge a lot ofit comes from China bots, and
then a lot of them are fromRussia. Like, Russia's actual,
like, public what is it? Theirinternational I used to know
this. They used to they used topublicize their, like, how they

(20:42):
maybe it was leaked, but theyhad something where this is what
we do.
Like, our our goal is to justdestabilize other countries in
this manner by splittingbasically society in those
nations. I'll I'll have to findit, see if I can find that that
article again. But once yourealize that's like, why has the

(21:03):
United States been so dividedover the past, what, 6 years
now? 7 years? Makes a lot ofsense when you start looking at
it as as first way.
If you sit down with someoneelse that shares a complete
opposite view of you, just sitdown next to them and talk to
them, you do not scream at eachother in 240 characters.

No. And 99% of the time when you do that, that
person doesn't come off as yourmortal enemy. Whereas in in in
x, it's this person is planningto kill me, and I have to tell
you know, I have to tell themeverything about my political
stance.

Yeah. It's the oh, man. So this we're getting
like a social media rant now, Iguess, now. The whole

Why not? We're not? No. I said why not.

Oh, why not? The whole where the Internet is
now so if something is wrong oryou feel like injustice has
happened to you because of avideo game is going to require a
sign in to another service. Thisis this is this happened over
the weekend.

I was about to say, are you are you referencing
Sony here?

Yeah. So so yeah. People will send death
threats to developers, softwaredevelopers, and to corporations.
It's, like, when when did we getat a society where that's okay?

You know where? It's whenever we became
anonymous. You're anonymous onthe the Internet. You're not
really, but you but you feellike you are. If you have to
stare another human being in theeyes and say horrible things,
I'm going to kill you orwhatever those they said to
those developers, There's aconsiderably different impact to

(22:53):
looking someone in the eyesversus just typing in 200
something characters.
You know, obviously, you youcan't type I'm gonna kill you on
on Twitter. But but theanonymity is just empowers
people to do horrible things Youor say horrible.

You say that, though, but a lot of these
people that's it's theiraccount, and they they have
their name on their account. Sothey're it's not truly the
anonymous thing either.

I do think, though, I do think that there is
a disconnect between looking atyour screen and looking at a
human being.

I a 100% agree.

A 100% agree. The anonymity because the the
digital nature of what spans inbetween you just does it doesn't
feel like a human being on theother side.

Yeah. I think I think it also stems from
frustration, and this is on theperson who's making, by the way,
this is not justifying theirbehavior. Just trying to
understand it. I think it'sthey're frustrated because they
don't have any control over thatsituation as well. And Yeah.

(23:55):
I like, for me, if I getfrustrated, I'll go in the
garage and I, like, you runpower tools and and work on an
engine or whatever. Right? Youdo the same thing. When you get
frustrated, you go down in thegarage or in your basement and
go work on something.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Or or You

try you try to channel it into something
healthy.

Yeah. Like, go exercise or lift weights or
something like that. I I I walkmy I walk in extra when I get
frustrated.

Okay. I I've got a I got a funny story. So behind
my house growing up, I I livedin the in the not it wasn't the
suburb. Well, it was the suburb,but it was like the edge of the
suburbs. So my back my backyardbacked up to a street and then
beyond that was just like Woods.
Everything in the otherdirection was all suburbia. So

(24:45):
we were just the edge ofsuburbia. Across the street,
there was a field where people Idon't know why, but they would
just dump trash there. And andnot just, like, small amounts.
There was, like, tons of it.
And at one point in time, a fewdump trucks came in, and they
dumped toilets. And we're nottalking about 4 or 5 toilets. 10

(25:05):
toilets. We're talking aboutprobably a 150 toilets into this
giant toilet mountain. So it'sthis huge white porcelain
mountain and and, of course,they were all beat up and and
and and trash and whatnot.
So I used to when I would getfrustrated, I would get my
sledgehammer and I would just goto toilet mountain and just go

(25:26):
to town on these things And itwas so therapeutic to just blast
a whole bunch of toilets, andyou feel good at the end of
that, but I don't know. Maybe Iwas lucky because I had toilet
mountain.

Well, there's also there's you know how they
have escape rooms? Yeah. So Oh,yeah. So escape rooms are like a
building where you can enterwith your a bunch of friends or
whatever, and and there'spuzzles, and you try to escape.
There's a bunch of differentit's almost like crypto puzzles
at Defcon and stuff like that.
It's kind of cool. Mhmm. Butthey have kind of the same idea,

(26:00):
but it's you just get to breakshit. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. You just

get to go nuts for a period of time.

Yeah. You know what? Next time I'm up in
Denver, we should go do anescape room. I've never done
one.

Oh, you've never done one? Okay. They're fun.
Yeah. Oh, well, actually, wait.
Okay. I shouldn't say that. I'vedone an escape room once, and I
actually had a really bad timeat it. But I could tell that it
would be really, really fun. Andthe reason why I had a bad time
is because I love artists todeath, but I did an escape room
with a bunch of artists that Ididn't know.

(26:34):
And I was the only engineerthere. And I'm trying to think
of things analytically andlogically to get out of this
room, and these artists are justgoing freaking ham on
everything. And I'm like, guys,what you're doing makes no
sense. And so you kinda have tohave I feel like it would be fun
to have a good mix of people,but if you're in an escape room

(26:54):
with people who don't thinkanything like you, then it's
frustrating as hell.

Yeah. Yeah. We should go do more fun. That
sounds like a lot of fun.

Yeah. It'd be really fun.

This podcast is off the rail.

Why not? We're having fun.

So I guess to circle it back around is on on
costs, especially US taxes andstuff like that is just take it
take look at look at everythingfrom, like, a mile like, start
looking at everything. What andso sure. It's a lot of money,
and we print a zillion dollars,but is is there anything we can

(27:31):
do at this point?

Yeah. The one thing I wish we could do, and I
just don't think anyone would bewilling to do it, is to have
more granular things that wevote on. Instead of these
gigantic money pit bills that wevote on, these omnibus bills, I
wish we could just vote on thismoney goes to this thing. Vote

(27:54):
yes or no. You know?
And and it's not$280,000,000,000. It's, you
know, a 150,000,000 to this, youknow, to this one bridge or
whatever. You know? Vote onsingle topic items.

Well, that's a lot of cities do it or a lot of
cities where you will vote onthat kind of stuff.

I think what you're the US Congress.

Yeah. I think what you're talking about is is
because what people say is, oh,United States is a democracy.
It's that's actually incorrect.It's a republic because you vote
for representatives to vote onthe majority of things for you.
That's how it works.
That's why we don't we as thevoters don't actually vote on an

(28:36):
omnibus. We vote for arepresentative that does vote on
that.

That votes in the way that we would if we did.

You would hope. Well, that that

that's that's the plan. Well, and that's the
reason that's that's that's thereason why they have term limits
because if they don't vote theway you want, you just put
someone else in that hopefullyWhat if votes the way

you want. I know we've been shitting on on
Twitter. What if what if youvoted on omnibuses via Twitter?

Oh, god. Twitter You wanna make Twitter more of a
cesspool? No. No. Thank you.
Yeah. We do we do not needelectronic voting through social
media.

I think a lot more people that would vote,
though. No. Because then you'dhave to have some kind of way of
authenticating through Twitterand that sounds awful.

Yeah. No. Let's let's not do that. I I I I think
okay. I think there does need tobe at least some price to vote.
And what I mean by that, votingis a it is an absolute right,
and it is something that you weshould take pride in, and it is
part of our civil duty, but itshouldn't be the absolute

(29:50):
easiest thing to do. I think youI I like the idea of you go to a
place and this this is my timeto vote. And I've done my
research, and I've I know theissues, and I know the people
I'm going to, and you put effortinto it. It shouldn't just be
like a push notification thatcomes up on your phone and be
like, which thing do you like?Press yes or no.

(30:11):
Like, I don't think I don'tthink we need to boil it down to
it being that easy. There needsto be some effort behind it.

You made it easier to because the problem we
have with that is there's not alot of good pollings there's not
enough polling stations. That'sthe problem with that. And going
to location so the problem withthat is, so the the problem with

(30:39):
that is there's a the people whowork the law is if you go vote,
your your employer can't stopyou. Right? I don't know if they
have to pay you, though.
Mean that No.

I don't think they do, but they have to allow
reasonable time for you to go

Yeah. But they don't pay you. And if you're
working hourly and the fact thatthe majority of people in
America are working paycheck topaycheck, meaning that they
missed a couple hours, they'regonna be behind on their bills.
And now you're basically thosekind of people just can't get to
the voting station at allbecause they just they they

(31:16):
don't have the money becausetheir their social economic
position is they can't take thetime off to go vote, basically.

Well, but but but the polls are open in many times
early on and after work as well,and and there's it's rare that
there's there's voting that isonly available in one day for a
short period of time. So theyvoting is is typically fairly

(31:44):
easy to schedule to

figure out how to do this. You're assuming that
if you can go vote, you can getin and out. I know for a fact
that's not the case.

Sure. You know, if you don't system it's going
to be perfect.

If it was showing up at a station and it
was, like, 5 minutes in and out,you can do it on the way to
work, or you do it on the wayback from work, or on your lunch
break. Sure. But the problem isthat's not the case.

Yeah. Well, I mean I mean, you're you're
making a bunch of claims here. II I would be curious to see what
the data actually shows on thatbecause, I mean, the way you're
presenting it isn't it doesn'twork this way. But

I just know from the

last across the board.

I'm talking about this is, like, Texas
elections. The the data showsthat basically, like, in the
less fortunate social economicareas have less polling
stations, and they run out ofmaterials. Because we have to
have, like, special paper now.

Yeah. I remember that was actually a really
unique thing in Texas last timewhere they were they were
running out of paper. And evenwhen they called for restocking,
it was taking a significantamount of time. Yeah. And so Now
so that's an example of thesystem breaking down.
Yeah.

And so you had really long poll lines and
people just not being able tovote. So I think there's a way
we need to speed that up andalso make it more accessible to
people because I'm, honestly,I'm, like, putting effort into
it if a part of this way is itdoesn't feel like even if you do

(33:17):
all your research, you don't getanything back from it.

Other than the satisfaction of of doing your
duty. I guess. I I you you Ivote. Participated in in one of
the greatest governments thathas ever existed. It's kind of
cool.

Maybe if my politicians actually pay
attention to us normal people.So but that doesn't seem to be
the case.

Yeah. Yeah.

If if they All

I'm saying is I don't think we should boil it
down to a push notification on aphone.

I can agree there that that Twitter thing
was a joke, but I do think weneed to figure out how to make
it faster to get in and out. Ifyou wanna use polling stations,
we need need a lot more polling.At least here in Texas, a lot
more polling stations. Becauseif you're out in the suburbs, I
waited I think the lastpresidential election, I waited
3 hours in line, early voting.So Wow.

(34:07):
Yeah. It was ridiculous.

I I I've I've I guess I've been lucky because
I've never had that situation.Every time I've ever voted, it's
just been walk in, show them myID, go to town.

Now for all the local elections, it's always
like that. Yeah.

Yeah. 1, a

lot less people show up, and they have all the
normal polling stations open.And by the way, this is Houston,
Texas I'm talking about. I didvote a couple actually, no. I
didn't vote at all when I was incollege and up in Austin. And I
never became a Oklahoma citizenwhen I worked in Oklahoma.
So I'd those 6 months inOklahoma, I I didn't partake in

(34:46):
any elections up there. So,yeah, I've actually only know
about voting in Houston. But,yeah, the presidential
elections, there's no good timeto go to the polling station at
all.

Yeah. So You know, up here, they we do we do
vote by mail in in Colorado,which I know there's lots of
potential. Let's just put itthat way. I mean, people we may

(35:17):
may upset people with this, butthe the there's there's
potential for fraud with that. II I absolutely think that there
that could happen.
I'm not saying it does. I thinkit could, but so far, it's been
it's been pleasurable. Let's putit that way. Because we get our
ballots, and then a few weekslater, Colorado is really

(35:37):
fantastic at sending out thiswhole packet that explains every
single thing you're voting on,and it gives the primary four
vote and primary opposition. Itgives voices for those that have
explanations about them.
Things like, you know, we werejust mentioning the Chips Act.
It could be a blank check. Theopposition will say, we don't

(35:58):
want to allow for blah blahblah. We don't wanna give
someone a blank check. And andand so

It explains like if there's a proposition,
it says this is what theproposition's for. This is what
what it's against.

And what's nice is the they they don't seem to
do much editing to it. So, youknow, whoever's for or against
their words seem to be theirwords, which is which is
fantastic. And and and sosometimes the the opposition
will write, here's how thisperson is purposefully
misinterpreting or or or orobfuscating the the language in

(36:32):
this to make it seem like it'sthis. Well, it's that. And so
I've I've really appreciatedthat too because I like to sit
down, take a night, read throughall the propositions, make up my
mind about each one.
And so mail in voting has beenfantastic for for that. I
actually I'm I'm fairly prothat. Although, like I said, I'm

(36:53):
skeptical about the the abilityfor it to not be gained.

Yeah. I'm I'm I'm a 100% for Malin because it
does solve, basically, theproblems that I have with
polling stations. And I've donesome I wouldn't say research,
but I have looked for is thereproblems with fraud for it. And
everything I can find is it'sspecifically not fraud happens

(37:18):
more at polls than it does inmail in ballots. That's the only
thing I can find.

Yep. I don't know. There's something more if
this is purely an emotionalstatement, but there there's
something more trustworthy in mymind about showing up to a place
and, you know, pressing thebutton on what I want. There's
just something that feels moresolid than that as opposed to
just taking my piece of paperand dropping it in a mailbox and

(37:45):
being saying trust this. Right?
Mhmm.

I know. I can see that being a a valid
concern.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh. But like I said, I I don't
have any data to actually backany of that up.
But the one thing I I can say, Idon't trust anyone to not cheat.
So if it was possible, I wouldabsolutely a 100% think that
somebody would 100% do it. I I Igenerally think that if humans
can do corrupt things, theygenerally tend to do corrupt

(38:16):
things.

I think that's what we're talk did we ever talk
about I think it was last week.Yeah. Because last week, we
talked about Apple. And and

I like how we went from corruption to Apple.

Oh, no. No. No. No. No.
Not about that. It it's thewhole corporations. Their entire
purpose is to be greedy becausethat's that's they're codified
to do that. So it's it's itstems from that. Right?
Mhmm. If so, Man, we are way offtopic. It's a weird podcast.
Yeah. Let us know I don't evenknow I want people to respond to

(38:48):
this.

I mean, what what even would they respond to?
We're all over the place. Yeah.

I mean

You you know what? Okay. Typically typically
before an episode, we've saidthis many times, Parker and I
typically pregame. And most ofthe time, that's it's not, like,
intentional. It's just we bothlog on.
We're working on the show notes,or we're doing whatever. We just
start BS ing about a bunch ofstuff, and it usually ends up
being kinda like what we'retalking about

right now.

But we didn't pregame a lot before this
episode, so I guess we'regetting it all out in the
opposite.

Basically, what we've been thinking about for
the past week.

Right. Right. Right.

Yeah. It's it's interesting stuff. I don't
pretend to have I don't pretendthat we have solutions for these
kind of things. We're electricalengineers. What I like to do the
best is I just like tounderstand what the problems
are.
That's what I like to try to getto. Oh. And figuring out that
kind of stuff. That's way moreinteresting than actually

(39:46):
finding a solution half thetime.

I I I I really enjoy looking at a problem and
and knowing that I can come upwith what I think the answer to
this problem is pretty quickly,but then stepping back and
saying, but what do other peoplethink? What are the other
arguments that are going to itand trying to understand someone

(40:09):
else's argument? Because it'sreally easy to just sit back and
be like, this is how it is. Thisis my position and I will die on
this hill. It is very, very hardto try to understand someone
else's position.
Now you can hear someone else'sposition, but understanding it
is the next level. And and it'sfascinating to, in some cases,

(40:33):
step back and say, how the helldid you even come to that
conclusion? What is your what isthe pattern or path that your
mind had to go to to say this ishow I think it is and this is
the hill that I'm gonna die on?And I think that really helps
either tear down my own positionor bolster it even more.

Yeah. It's not something you can't do in 240
characters.

And we're right back to Twitter.

Yeah. Right back looping back around.
Alright. Let's talk about EDAtools now.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. We're we're we're nearing
the end here.

Yeah. But Let us know what you wanna talk
about with if you about thatkind of topic. It's kinda weird.
I won't blame if people arelike, politics and taxes. I'm
gonna turn this off.
I I will not blame peoplebecause we tip we never ever
talk about that kind of topic.But it's just something Yeah.
It's been coming up a lot insocial media and the news, and

(41:27):
Chip Sacks has been making a lotbig splash recently.

So We're in an election year. Elections are
always fun. Yep. So Okay. Yeah.
Let let's let's pivot. Let'spivot and talk about EDA tools.
Yeah.

This is what people are here for.

So so I I I had a topic that I wanted to just
kinda go over because I don'tthink we've ever really covered
this. I I I I wanna talk realquick about the the the price to
play when it comes with EDAtools.

This is gonna be more people are gonna
complain about this than Thanall the politics. The politics
we just talked about.

Yeah. Actually, I would love that. I would really
love that because I went out andI got pricing information on a
bunch of different EDA tools.Just, you know, if say you're
starting a new business oryou're a manager coming in and
you need to start an engineeringteam or whatever, what do you
what do you even go and buy? Andwhat, you know, what kind of
money do you have to spend?

(42:22):
And what EDA tool do you pick? Ithought it would be fun to just
kinda take a cross section andlook at EDA tools. But before I
do that, I I have a question foryou, Parker. Mhmm. What are your
thoughts on subscription versusownership when it comes to
software?

Oh, boy. So when Eagle moved to the
subscription service, I wasactually okay with it because so
before then, Eagle and a lot ofpeople didn't like that. And I
understand why because you wouldpay a big lump sum, and then you
got to keep the software foreverforever forever. That's what a
lot of people did. A lot ofpeople would buy, like, version

(42:58):
6 of Eagle, and they would beusing version 6 forever,
basically, because they have aperpetual license, which is
totally valid.
I don't understand why I'd dothat, but I like getting the new
updates. And so the lump sum waspaying the lump sum basically
every year for the latestversion Eagle was way more

(43:18):
expensive than the than thesubscription service was. It
still is, by the way. I thinkEagles 6.80 a year, and then
back when Eagle was a perpetuallicense, I think it was, like,
1,500 for that perpetual. So,sure, if you were keeping the
same version of Eagle for 3years, it would work out, but I

(43:40):
always wanted the latestversion.
So it really depends because I Iknow a lot more software are
moving to subscription. And whatwe said earlier is, corporations
are greedy because so they'redoing money. Right? Money. 100%.
What what the subscriptionservice really does is it it
flattens out their theirprediction of money, basically,

(44:02):
their income. Whereas, you know,if if you're selling to say
Eagle and you're selling the newversion, you have these big
spikes when you have a newversion come out, and then it
just trails off. Right? So it'svery hard to gauge your runway
of a company when that's yourmodel. Whereas subscription
service, you can be like, okay.
We have 10,000 subscribers thatare paying this is like Netflix.

(44:28):
Netflix is probably as 1,000,000probably or more. But, yo, we
have 10,000 at $10 a month. Sowe have that's our income
basically for our service. So Iguess I'm kinda indifferent on
this because it really dependson what is offered.
If it's a software that neverchanges, I am I'm much against

(44:50):
the subscription. But if it's asoftware that changes a lot and
is in actively development, Ican see subscription working
out. This kinda carries over tovideo games where you have,
like, live service games, likeWorld of Warcraft, and I think
there's Fortnite, etcetera. Idon't play Fortnite, but the
only one that I play reallyplayed is well, the workout then

(45:13):
back then you didn't even callthat a live service game. But
it's a subscription servicegame.
So you pay x dollars a month,and then you get all the updates
and the new stuff. Right?Whereas the traditional model
was you pay $60 and you did avideo game. Right?

Right.

And you get that video game forever.

Which, surprisingly, that $60 has been
$60 for a long time.

Very, very, very long time. It's up it's up
to 70 now. Most triple a gamesare

But it but it was but it was a it it is 70 is more
of the norm now with videogames, but 70 was not unheard of
before.

No. If you want history, the n 64 had $70 games.

Yeah. Yes. Absolutely. I I I paid $70 for
a, a Super Nintendo game back inthe day.

Boy, it had the FX chip in it.

Yeah. Right. Right. Right. So so okay.
Here's my thoughts on when itcomes to subscription. If if if
I'm paying a subscriptionservice for software that I'm
just getting the software forthat subscription service. I
typically don't really lookfavorably up upon that. And and

(46:25):
and and I understand that's alittle cryptic, but let me
explain it. I subscribe toFusion 360, and I think that is
worth every penny of thatsubscription service.
And the reason why is because Icouldn't afford an equivalent of
that That is not a subscriptionservice. The amount of stuff you
get with with with Fusion 360,You get Eagle. You get all of

(46:49):
Fusion 360. You get all of

Like,

the cam tool. Plugins, all the analysis, all
the camps of that if I wanted topurchase that as a stand alone
software program, that would betens of 1,000 of dollars worth
of stuff. In my opinion, that'sworth the subscription service.
But if if I say have 2 pieces ofsoftware that do the exact same
thing and one is a pay it, youget it perpetual license and one

(47:15):
is a subscription service, butthey do identical things, I'll
I'll I'll lean towards the payonce for it thing. So the
subscription service, I feellike I need to get more.
I need to be able to bysubscribing to it, I get more
than what I could afford if Iwanted to pay for the the the
standalone. That that is ajustification in my mind at

(47:41):
least for, paying for asubscription service.

It's kinda like the difference between you're
paying how much does Netflixcost down? $17 a month? I
canceled a long time ago. It wasit was 999 when I canceled it.
But for, let's say, $17

and you're and let's this is using your
analogy.

For $17, you have access to a 1000000 movies.
How much would it cost to buyall a 1000000 of those movies?

Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's an extreme example. Yeah.
That's right.
Right. It's it's your logic.Sure. Sure. I guess what I'm
saying is the alternative toFusion 360 is I would have to
buy an EDA tool.
I would have to buy a cam tool.I'd have to buy a 3 d modeling
tool and blah blah blah. If Iwere to price all of those

(48:32):
things out that would have thesame levels of features as
Fusion 360, there's no way onearth I could afford it, and I
wouldn't be able to do it. Well,like, what

if we're talking does SOLIDWORKS have a
subscription?

A stand alone?

Yeah.

Probably.

Pricing guide.

I feel like the value just needs to be lopsided
in in my favor. And with theFusion 360, it does feel that
way. They have to have asubscription. They

do have a subscription. But the stand
alone for for standard, I don'tknow what the different levels
mean. The standard premiumprofessional as of 2 years ago,
4, 8, and 12 k.

Right. Right. Like, 4 k, and that's just
SOLIDWORKS, which is 3 dmodeling. Now there's there's a
lot more to it than that. Butdoes it come with a thermal
analysis?
Does it come with, cam? Does itcome with an EDA tool? Does it
come with all this other stuff?Probably not. So even that is
not a good enough representationof what you get for a

(49:34):
subscription, which frankly,$680 a year is expensive.
I'm not saying it's not. I'mjust saying I feel like you get
way more out of it for that thatprice.

No. I hear you.

You get you get 15,000, $20,000 worth of
software for 600

and 80 a year. Yeah. That's what? That's 4
Netflix subscriptions a month.You're probably you're probably
subscribed to more than 4 videostreaming services.

Maybe. Maybe.

I just went through and canceled all that
stuff. That's not using it.

Well and and and the whole reason I bring that up
is because EDA tools, which iswhat this topic is about, is
kind of broken into yoursubscription or your pay once,
cry once plans. And it seems tobe that everyone is tipping a
little bit more towardssubscriptions even though
subscription has actually beenaround for quite a while with

(50:28):
EDA tools. In fact, I feel likeEDA tools had this going on a
long time ago, but they justdescribed it in a different way.
You still purchase the package,but they'd have, like,
maintenance fees or things likethat that you would pay or
upkeep charges and stuff thatyou would pay on a on a on a
regular basis. So I feel likethey've kind of just rolled that

(50:48):
up into, okay, well, now youdon't own the software.
You just pay just themaintenance fees.

You paid for the battle pass for your

e Mutual. I like that, the battle pass.

That's what it is. Because you because you can
I think you can well, actually,I take that back? I know there's
some software if you refuse topay the maintenance, they just
lock your licenses out

now. Correct. Correct.

Yeah.

And some of them okay. So so some of them also
offer short term leases, Iguess, you could say. So, like,
monthly seats where you couldjust turn it on when you know
you there's a surge and you knowyour double e team needs 5
licenses. So maybe you buy 2perpetual licenses, but you need
to you need to bump it upbecause everyone's working on a

(51:34):
board, and then it and then itgoes down.

Right? Yeah. You go to Blockbuster and rent.
Rent.

Rent a seat.

Rent a seat.

Yeah. And and and with the subscription stuff, you
also get a lot of the extra plugins, a lot of the extra
analysis, which for most of theother tools with that don't have
the subscription model, thoseare additional charges that you
get paid for, or they can alsobe additional subscriptions that

(52:02):
you pay for on top of that. Youcan have a subscription to a
plug in that plugs into yoursubscription that you have for
the main tool. So it getscomplex really fast, but I
thought it would be fun to breakEDA tools down into 3 different
sections that we can describetheir costs. And if you are
looking for a new EDA tool or ifyou're looking to outfit your
double e team, hopefully, thisgives some firepower to you.

(52:26):
So so the first one, I I calledit the real small players, and
this is all the free stuff. Thisis all the stuff that if your
company is really small, you'rejust starting out, or if you
have a very, very simplisticproduct, this is a potential
option for you. And we got stufflike free PCB, Libre PCB,
EasyEDA, PCB artist, and pad topad. These these programs are

(52:51):
all free. A handful of them docome with some baggage where I
say baggage as in it's like a alarger company created it, this
software, such that you woulduse their service to purchase
parts or or things of that sort.
So that's something to keep inmind with these. Usually, it's

(53:12):
free for a reason, minus perhapsLibre PCB. PCB is what that's
open source. Right? Yeah.

So I think free PCB is also one of the it
doesn't have the baggage.

Right. Right. Right. Right. And so I'm I'm I
when I say that they're thesmall players, I don't wanna
make it seem like they're notfeature rich or capable.
It's just they they're gonnahave the the least amount of
tools, let's just say, in termsof making your life easy. And if
you're looking to design thehighest technology out there,

(53:49):
these are probably not youroptions. So just keep that in
mind. So the next tier, shall wesay, is, what I call the small
player. So we had the real smallplayers and now we're at the
small players.
And some of these straddle theline between not being small
anymore. I put KiCad in here,and the reason why KiCad here is

(54:10):
here just it's just because itsuser base is so gigantic. I
think it totally fits withinthis category. We have Eagle at,
$680 a year, and that 6.80 isthe Fusion 360 cost because
Eagle is now wrapped up inthere. And then, of course, I
threw DIP trace in there justbecause that was that's my tool,

(54:31):
and that is anywhere from $75 to$995, and that's a perpetual
license.
The DipTrace. But when you buyinto a version with DipTrace,
you buy that version. If theyupgrade to the next version of
DipTrace, you have to pay theprice difference to go to
whatever the next version is. Ihave DipTrace 4 right now, and I

(54:54):
know they're going to bereleasing 5. And if I wanted to
upgrade to 5, it's probablygonna cost me $300 to upgrade to
5, but that doesn't mean that 4loses its viability whatsoever.
So, actually, what's fun is inthis category, the smaller
player category with DIPtrace,Eagle, and KiCad. KiCad is free,

(55:15):
Eagle is subscription, andDipTrace is perpetual license.
So there's 3 options there incase one of those works for
whatever your pricing plan is.So then the next level up is
what I call the big players, andthese are all you the, like,
professional level. Not sayingthat the ones beneath us are not

(55:35):
professional.
These are just the ones that,like, have the perception of the
professional level EDA tools.So, of course, there's Altium.
That's about $55100 a year. Iactually confirmed that the
other day because a buddy ofmine just purchased it, and that
is a yearly price. I don't thinkthey call it a subscription per

(55:56):
se, but it this fits more of themaintenance fee style.

Gotta get that Altium battle pass.

And and and to to be honest, when it comes to to
this to what Altium gives you,$55100 a year may be a steal for
for what you're looking for.Because Altium is very feature
rich, and it has a hugecommunity, and it does have all
the all the options. It may notfit your enterprise level,
though, because a some of theseother tools are more suited for,

(56:29):
oh, hey. You have 2,000engineers working at your
company. We have tools that areprepped and ready to go for
2,000 engineers.
Whereas, Altium may be moresuited for a team of, oh, you
have 10. It might work betterfor you in that sense. So
there's a lot of research to doin terms of which one works best

(56:50):
for your size of your team.

I would say a better way to redo your tiers is
size of company or size of howmany people working on your on
these projects.

Well, yeah, I I could I could see that too, but
but for example, my buddy whojust bought Altium, he's the
only engineer at the company.So, you know, what he's the only
person at the company, and he'sone of 3 people. So size of
company doesn't necessarilyjudge it.

So what what I'm saying is if you're just
building boards, you don't needprobably I say just building
boards because all theseprograms eventually build
boards.

Just build boards. Right? All of these.
That's the goal.

Well, I'm getting that is if the
complexity of your projects. Ifyour if your complexity is low
and you don't have a lot ofpeople, then you can get away
with probably something likeKiCad, Eagle, DIP trace. Whereas
Right. Altium starts putting intools that allow you to manage
stuff across other projects,like your library, a parts. It

(57:57):
helps you manage between 2engineers.
It handles that stuff.

Document control, revision control, history,
things of those sort. Just justkeep in mind is as you go down
the list, those things are notunachievable. It's just they end
up being more in your control.In other words, like, when you
get to the bottom of this list,it's more well, however, you
saved it in in your computer ishow you do revision control.

(58:26):
Whereas as you go up the list,they they they they tend to have
more tools that equip you forthings of that sort.
Yep. So so next on the list isis Cadence OrCAD, which this one
is interesting. There's there'sthere's a handful of options
with it. Actually, a lot ofthese have a lot of these larger
companies have multipledifferent offerings that do kind

(58:50):
of the same thing, and and soyou could choose like, for
instance, with with CadenceOrCAD, there's Allegro PCB
Designer, which is $1500 a monthfor a seat, but there's also the
OrCAD X Professional, which tobe honest, I don't know what the
difference is between them otherthan the fact that Allegro is
1500 and OrCAD Professional is52100. So you'd have to research

(59:12):
what the difference is betweenthem, but you can see that as we
go down this list, things arestarting to get quite a bit more
expensive.
Inside of Siemens, there's pads,which has more affordable
options of about $250 a month,but they do go all the way up to
about 3 k a month. And and afterthese levels, you start getting

(59:34):
into tools that are moreindustry specific or or they
they they have very specifictools that work really well for
some industries and are justcompletely unnecessary for other
industries. So SiemensExpedition can cost upwards of
70 k for just the the flatprogram, and then there's a slew

(59:56):
of plug ins that you can add toit so you can start getting
really expensive. And then thelast one I have on the list is
Zukin, which before I got intothe aerospace industry, I had no
clue what it is, but apparentlyand I and I still actually,
honestly, have no clue what itis. I talked to one person
who've used it before.

(01:00:17):
Apparently, Zukin was, LockheedMartin went to Mentor Graphics,
and then and I may be completelywrong here. I've just been told
this. But but Lockheed Martinfired Mentor Graphics, went to
Zukin and said, if we give you abunch of money, will you
retrofit your software to bewhat we need it to be? And Zukin

(01:00:41):
was like, I got you. So Zukin isit is it is geared towards what
Lockheed Martin needs and withwith, like, DOD contracts and
things like that.
Zukin is one of the few thatdoesn't have a sub a
subscription service, at thishigher level. It's perpetual,

(01:01:01):
and it's around 47100 to 11 kfor a perpetual license based
off of the plugins you need. So,overall, you can go from the
freest of free with noguardrails whatsoever.

Parker Dillmann (01:01:16):
With free

Stephen Kraig (01:01:17):
All the way up to yeah. Yeah. Right. Right. Free
free in free in every possibleway all the way up to you need
to have a full simulation toolsfor signal integrity and the
craziest field solving software,all spans within this.
So it's the basically, the sky'sthe limit in terms of how much
money you wanna spend on it.

Yeah. This is, like, including, like, the newer
stuff like GJETEX and all thatstuff.

Yeah. Well, okay. Actually, what's funny is this
doesn't include any of the AIEDA tools, which that would be
cool to do, like, a comparisonsometime in the future about all
the AI stuff because these areall, like, the classic guys or
the free guys, which some ofthese even the more expensive
ones have not even really beenaround that long, but some of

(01:02:04):
these have been around fordecades.

Yeah. Even even Zukin is, like, early eighties
starting out.

Zukin is a Right.

Is a Japanese company. I had to look that up
because I've never heard of thatthat tool before. You were we
were talking about a little bitabout before the podcast, and
you you said that as you'relooking at aerospace jaws for
for layout PCB layout, we'll sayit requires Zukin experience.
It's like, how do you even getthat experience? It's

it's super chicken and egg because you only
get it if you work at one ofthose companies, and but they
want it before you work at thatcompany. Yeah. Whatever.

I think that's really funny.

So I I I've I've talked to one person who has
ever used Zukin before, and, ofcourse, he came from Lockheed
Martin. So, hopefully, thatjust, you know, gives you a
little bit of firepower and atleast gives you a list of, you
know, here's here's some placesto go and look if you're if
you're starting out or if, likeI said, you need to outfit a

(01:03:03):
team and get things get thingsgoing. I personally say the real
small players are they're greatto learn on the big players in I
in all the times that I've usedthe big players, I've always
felt like they are perhaps toomuch. The small or the middle

(01:03:24):
players, like the KiCad, Eagle,dip trace can do way more than
you think you can they than youthink. So don't just write them
off because they don't fit inthe big professional land.
Think about them and think aboutwhat your company needs and if
they can get away with that.

It's really hard to this is the problem with
it. It's really hard to changetools mid company to to change
because you you're abandoningyour libraries. You're banning
all your previous designs andand history. K. I'll I'll I'll I
actually will say it this way isif you are only planning on
having one layout person orthat's doing the schematics as

(01:04:03):
well, probably you're gonna beokay with KiCad.

Right. Unless you need unless you need

a feature that Altium has, like some kind of
simulation tool, then sure. Butif you don't need any of
anything beyond a DRC checker,KiCad's gonna be great for you.

You you know, you you'd be surprised that what you
get when you go to the higherlevels is more control and and
and more tools, like you said,simulation and analysis and
things like that. But you don'tthey don't necessarily
inherently make a better board.They just have tools that

(01:04:42):
perhaps aid you in making abetter board, but not even that.
Can you make identical boards inKiCad and Altium? Absolutely.
You could make the exact sameboard. Now with they'd obviously
have slight differences becausethe programs just don't function
identically, but they would thethe board would work just the
same in in real life. And so soso is is is something like an

(01:05:07):
Altium inherently better than aKiCad? In my opinion, no. Not at
all.
Unless it has the tools that youmust have to get your your job
done. KiCad is likely to nothave that kind of a tool. Yeah.
And But that doesn't thatdoesn't make it inferior in any
way. Yeah.
And that's what I'm saying

is with Altium, if you are planning on having a
even if you're starting out withjust one engineer, you're
planning on having a team ofengineers working on boards,
then going to a tool like Altiumout the gate makes more sense
because it gives you morecontrol over your libraries,
gives you more control ofrevision history, that kind of

(01:05:46):
stuff. That is, in my opinion,way more important than, than
the EDA tool outputting Gerbers.Right? That's way more important
for me as an engineer. And thenwhen you have 10,000 engineers,
that's when you start looking atcadence pads, Siemens, Zukin,
etcetera.

Right. Right. Right. Right. Yeah.
And and at that time, you know,if you have 10,000 engineers,
you have a dedicated supportteam at that company

Yeah.

That makes sure that everything's running
smoothly.

Yep. And you probably happen to have an
entire engineering team that'sjust handling your package
libraries.

Oh, yeah. You know, you have librarians. Yeah.
Full of yeah. Absolutely.

Yeah. So that's why I'm getting that with the
scale. Like, where Yeah. Whereare you looking at? How many
employees you're gonna be havingusing these tools?
And Right.

Because

if it's just gonna be one person, you can
probably and you don't need anyof the fancy simulation tools.
KiCats gonna work fine. I'drather go back to Eagle. Oh, on
that. Oh, let's wrap this up.
Let's wrap up this

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. We need to. Podcast. My first KeeCad PCB
worked 100% correct. Nice.
My first board I ever made inKeeCad. And this is

not a simple board. This is a pretty
complicated embedded system, SoI'm pretty happy. Well, you know
what that speaks to? That thatthat that means that the tool
doesn't necessarily matter. It'sthe guy driving it that that
really makes it matter.
And, also, you have plenty ofexperience with a bunch of
tools, so you know the rightquestions to ask to get what you

(01:07:30):
need.

Even if those questions make a lot of people
240 characters angry at me.

And with that, thank you for listening to
circuit break from MacroFab. Wewere your hosts, Steven Craig

and Parker Goldman. Take it easy. Later,
everyone. Thank you, s ubreaker, for downloading our
podcast. Tell your friends andcoworkers about circuit break,
the podcast from Macrofab.
If you have a cool idea,project, or topic you want us to
discuss, let Steven, I, and thecommunity of Breakers know. Our
community where you can findpersonal projects, discussions

(01:08:05):
about the podcast, andengineering topics and news, and
no politics unlike this episodedid. You can find it
atform.macfab.com.

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