A Knipex Cobra XS, an Opinel No 08 and a bit driver measured against a Leatherman Wave+ on weight, price and capability.
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SoC Intermediate 04: RTL synthesis and timing closure
Why a design can pass sign-off timing and still fail in silicon, and the machinery that decides it: what synthesis optimises, what static timing analysis actually proves, SDC exceptions and the damage they hide, reading a timing report, RTL versus tool fixes, and multi-corner multi-mode closure.
read moreDigital Design 02: Pull-up and pull-down networks
Why a static CMOS gate is always inverting, how series and parallel transistor networks turn into NAND and NOR, why NOR2 is the slower of the pair, and where the extra two transistors in an AND gate go.
read moreLashing a tripod
How to tie a clove hitch and a tripod lashing, and the wrap and frapping counts that let three poles open into a tripod.
read moreReading bark and leaves
A field key for ten common British trees built on bark and branching rather than leaves, and why the same species can carry two different bark patterns on one trunk.
read moreDigital Design 01: Mask sets, and how a transistor gets built
What a photomask is, the sequence of masks that turns a blank wafer into a MOSFET, why the mask count keeps climbing, the approximate cost of a mask set at each geometry from 250 nm down to 3 nm, and what an A1 metal spin costs against a B0 all-layer respin.
read moreSoC Intermediate 03: Pipeline design and hazards
Why adding a pipeline stage can make a processor slower, and the hazard machinery that decides the outcome: forwarding paths, load-use stalls, branch prediction and flush, structural conflicts, multi-cycle units, and the valid bits that keep exceptions precise.
read moreBuilding a folding bucksaw
A dimensioned build for a takedown bow saw around a 610 mm blade, and why folding it to blade length quietly caps how thick a log it will cut.
read moreSoC Intermediate 02: Cache coherency protocols
Why two threads with separate counters can run slower than one thread, and the coherency machinery that explains it: the single-writer rule, MESI states, read-for-ownership, snooping, directories, snoop filters, and the cache line granularity that no amount of reading the source code reveals.
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