Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1523825
78 DESIGN007 MAGAZINE I JULY 2024 That sounds like a fun role. We're constantly working with new technolo- gies and, for cost reasons, always trying to find the most inexpensive hardware to run our sys- tems. Low-cost embedded systems involve many challenges. ere are always problems to solve and new features to develop. We met because there was some hardware design in the curriculum for your degree. Exactly. Dr. Gary Spivey teaches an electri- cal engineering course called Embedded Sys- tems Design at George Fox, which was my first introduction to PCB design. We created a real- life PCB, and that process was very helpful and something I still cherish. When I worked for a PCB fabricator, it was fun to watch all the student designs come through our shop. It kickstarted my knowledge of successfully designing PCBs. Without that class, it would have taken much longer for me to develop enough PCB design skills to create a working board professionally. e class also taught me that I have a pas- sion for design. Even before I started making PCB designs professionally, it became a hobby aer graduating. I have an inventory of about 10 different PCB designs that I've done for personal projects, which also taught me more and helped me in the professional realm. If not for this experience, my employer would have just selected somebody else for the project. But why give it to someone who's never done it before? How did that student project compare to the first project assigned by your employer? ere were some similarities but a lot of dif- ferences. In class, there's just not enough time to review the more niche design features on a board. At my work, we oen develop RF appli- cations for wireless connections. Whether it's WiFi or Bluetooth, careful consideration is given to the actual design of the circuit, the board, the layout, and everything else when those features are on the board. For example, grounding is crucial in RF applications. Signal integrity and noise suppression typically aren't a concern in more basic applications, but it is a big deal for RF because it can significantly impact performance. Niche things like that obviously aren't covered in that class, but my coworkers helped me through it. Do you feel like you've mastered that design methodology now? Yes. I know what to pay attention to and the considerations to apply in the design. What's the most challenging board you've ever done? e most challenging board personally is my latest creation. is board has many features, including a piezo buzzer, which is like a basic speaker. It just buzzes, but you have to send a digital signal to it from the microcontroller. e microcontroller is doing two other func- tions: WiFi, which is RF, so you have noise considerations; and it's also reading high-pre- Alex Burt