Piotr Esden-Tempski @esden@chaos.social

The WTFpga #hackaday #supercon workshop was a great success! Thank you everyone who attended! If you were there I hope you had fun! :D The complete code and updated booklet are available on github. https://github.com/esden/wtfpga The only thing missing is the availability of the iCEBreaker and PMODs. I am working on that now and the crowd funding campaign will hopefully launch soon! :D https://www.crowdsupply.com/1bitsquared/icebreaker-fpga

The Crowd Supply Pre-Launch page for iCEBreaker FPGA development board is finally live! If you want to be notified when the campaign launches make sure to add yourself on the page. Or just follow me mere and I will tell you. I am very excited that we are one more step closer. ;-) https://www.crowdsupply.com/1bitsquared/icebreaker-fpga

All the goodies are now in the cube no 2! :D I am only missing the correct RPi image from @kernlbob ;)

Jeffrey is building the skeleton of cube no 3! :) The #ledcubism is multiplying! ;)

Work continues at Eugene Maker Space we got light on cube no. 2 :D Running @vifino SLED looking good! :D github.com/shinyblink/sled

The shell/LED displays of the cube are fully assembled. Wiring, brains and power come next! 🧵 🧠 💥:D‬

I have a visitor! @kbob is at 1BitSquared HQ and assembling some LED Cubes! Come to Crowd Supply Teardown this weekend if you want to see them! :D https://www.crowdsupply.com/teardown/portland-2019

And this is the carnage left of the part strips used to assemble 60 iCEBreakers :D

‪After ~4hours of assembly and reflow, mounting three new reels and refilling the matrix tray with ice40s and replaced wonky feeder we now have 60 shiny new iCEBreakers assembled! Testing them tomorrow. :)‬

Finally after a few hiccups wit the new panel setup we are finally assembling iCEBreaker v1.0d! Let’s cross fingers that everything goes smoothly from now on. *knock_on_wood* :)

Changed over the PnP to iCEBreaker v1.0d assembly. It took 5 hours of work. I did not even realize how long it took until I looked at the clock. Let’s see how much more time it will take until the first panel comes off the machine! But first some dinner ;)

Using the heater a little bit more it turns out that the plastic around the edge does actually melt a bit when you point the hot air at it for too long. Working away from the edge and being a bit more careful is recommended. It would indeed be nice if the face was all ceramic.

After a few hours of bring up, finding out that the 1v2 and 3v3 regulators were swapped and matching LED resistors. The Glasgow revC1 passes it's self test! This is very exciting! Now I can send the prototypes to the core developers for validation! :D

Finished reworking the boards and soldered in the connectors. Looking good! :)

So the verdict is in, the coffee warmer is a great tool! It really makes rework easier! And it fits under my microscope unlike the bigger hot plate. It also seems to be ok with some hot air action too! :D

The blue Glasgow boards need a little bit of rework. Fun with SOT666, I hope the new footprint that I am testing on the Black Magic Probe will be a little bit more robust and less prone to bridging...

Initial visual inspection of the soldering looks good. Besides the one ceramic cap that I managed to knock off at some point, but it was holding on to the board long enough so I could solder it back onto it's pads. Now I have to take a look into the bringup and testing process ;)

And done with reflow! Say hello to some shiny freshly baked Glasgow revC1 babies! :D

Finally! Many hours later all parts are placed on the Glasgow! I forget how much slower the meatbag PnP is compared to the real one. If only the setup of the real PnP would be less time consuming I would use it for prototypes too. I did save some time doing a "hybrid" approach :D

Finally placing one of the two brains of the Glasgow. @lattice iCE40HX8K FPGA! The fact that it has an open source toolchain is what makes the whole project work. Te framework synthesizes new bitstreams on the fly! Imagine installing a proprietary toolchain to use a debug tool...

All LEDs and single diodes placed! :D I like the look of the pink and white phosphors on the user LEDs. :D

Ok, all ceramic capacitors and resistors placed! The Glasgow has a lot of unique resistor values...