On Fri, May 29, 2009 at 5:35 PM, Vitaliy wrote: > However, it does seem that hardware design is akin to civil engineering: it > relies more on "pre-canned" solutions, and is easier for people to master > because it's more tangible. Yes you are probably right that hardware design relies more and more on pre-canned solutions. But there are many "cans", so I am not so sure whether it is easier for people to master or not. > It takes far less time to develop hardware for a > device, than it takes to write software for that same device. Unless we're > talking about switching power supplies or RF transceivers. :) Even for switching power supplies, we rely more and more on vendor recommended design whenever possible. For EMI/EMC issues, the vendors often can not really help though. And yes typically we finish the basic hardware design way ahead of firmware. And often you have firmware updates (to fix the anomalies) from time to time for a more complex design even though the hardware has long been stable. -- Xiaofan http://mcuee.blogspot.com -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist