Digital Hardware on Stepperbox

ESP32

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The ESP32 family of microcontrollers — cheap, capable, and versatile. Firmware development, WiFi and Bluetooth capabilities, deep sleep, and building autonomous devices.

FPGA

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Field-programmable gate arrays — designing custom digital logic in Verilog and VHDL, synthesis toolchains, and building processors, peripherals, and accelerators on reconfigurable hardware. The closest thing to making your own chip without a fab.

TPM

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Trusted Platform Modules — hardware roots of trust for key storage, measured boot, disk encryption, and attestation. How TPMs work, what they protect, and how to use them on Linux and embedded systems.

NFC

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Near-field communication — reading, writing, and emulating NFC tags. Access control, data exchange, and the security implications of contactless technology.

PCB Making

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Designing and fabricating printed circuit boards — schematic capture, layout with KiCad, etching, milling, and soldering. From prototype to small-run production without a fab house.

DIY PCB Fabrication

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Making circuit boards at home or in a small shop — laser toner transfer, photoresist and UV exposure, CNC isolation routing, and direct printing methods. Etching, drilling, plating, and getting reliable results without sending out to a fab.

Semiconductor Making

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The frontier of DIY fabrication — home lithography, oxide growth, doping, and the growing community of garage semiconductor fabrication. Understanding the processes that underpin all modern electronics.