22-year-old builds chips in his parents’ garage • Hacker News Board

Re: 22-year-old builds chips in his parents’ garage

#291

Post by moneywoes » Mon, Jan 24, 2022, 1:06 AM UTC

xvector wrote: post #20

TrackerFF wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's hard to compete with FAANG, Finance, and Consulting. Unfortunately, that's where a lot of people end up.

TC isn't everything. I'm pulling truly bonkers TC at 26, and yet I feel a deep void inside me. I recently realized that this void is because I am not living by my ideals/purpose. I know what I want to do in life, I know how I want to contribute to the story of humanity, and yet I am letting my greed overrule me and force me into a different path. Essentially, I am betraying myself, and this causes that feeling of unf…

Is there any reason you can't do both?

Re: 22-year-old builds chips in his parents’ garage

#292

Post by seoulmetro » Mon, Jan 24, 2022, 1:07 AM UTC

primax wrote: post #289

ad404b8a372f2b9 wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know many middle class families who would buy 10s of thousands of dollars worth of equipment for their kid.

You likely do and haven't realised. A decent quality upright piano is about $10000. Some kids have go karting or motorcycle racing hobbies. Some have archery, golf, etc. They all cost a lot of money over time. Hell, some kids sail! That's really not cheap.

That's only upper-middle class though.

So not much of the middle class.

Re: 22-year-old builds chips in his parents’ garage

#293

Post by quickthrower2 » Mon, Jan 24, 2022, 1:08 AM UTC

0xedd wrote: post #288

quickthrower2 wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The other factor is access to youtube to find likeminded people and have things explained and see what is possible. When I was young I loved computers but even install Linux or learn machine code seemed like this impenetrable world that was “for adults”. I think the modern internet is great for people sharing knowhow. That said this man is a genius!

Disagree. Didn't have YouTube, Google, etc and still cracked video game protections when i was 10.

What were your resources to learn this?

Re: 22-year-old builds chips in his parents’ garage

#294

Post by osrec » Mon, Jan 24, 2022, 1:12 AM UTC

amoorthy wrote: post #251

osrec wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Comfortable money + marketing hype keep it that way unfortunately. If governments really wanted to prioritise innovation, they should consider giving a banker's salary to a research scientist.

I'm torn on this. No doubt money is important but how much is needed? I've been thinking about this for a while [1] and I think more important to drive innovation is to change our culture to admire people who dedicate themselves to solving big problems over a long period of time. And a close second would be a culture that prizes modesty and eschews material wealth. I realize this may be a pipe-dream but it feels like…

If you want to stop the brain drain from more worthwhile areas to less worthwhile areas, you need to at least pay better starting salaries in the more worthwhile fields.

Otherwise, you'll end up with potential Einsteins playing with spreadsheets in investment banks rather than discovering relativity, simply because they wanted a bit of disposable income.

Stupid, yes, but that's the situation we're in.

Re: 22-year-old builds chips in his parents’ garage

#295

Post by DarylZero » Mon, Jan 24, 2022, 1:39 AM UTC

quantumwannabe wrote: post #144

DarylZero wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was with you at first but then... > Because those that think that money is the only thing standing between them and meaningful achievement... well, no amount of money will change that for them What? Why couldn't they just be right? You yourself just said: > Not that long ago the vast majority of scientific progress originated from rich men doing it in their free time Is a person still not allowed to understand the…

I think what he is arguing is that someone with a negative attitude ("he can only do that because he's rich!") won't accomplish anything even if they were granted unlimited funding because they are focused on coming up with excuses instead of thinking about what they can do. There are plenty of poor people in third-world countries who have far less than the original commentator (who presumably lives in the first worl…

But you're just assuming, or rather making up, the "fact" that any person saying that didn't accomplish anything and that this is a problem.

Poor people do accomplish things!

Re: 22-year-old builds chips in his parents’ garage

#296

Post by DarylZero » Mon, Jan 24, 2022, 1:40 AM UTC

sennight wrote: post #142

DarylZero wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was with you at first but then... > Because those that think that money is the only thing standing between them and meaningful achievement... well, no amount of money will change that for them What? Why couldn't they just be right? You yourself just said: > Not that long ago the vast majority of scientific progress originated from rich men doing it in their free time Is a person still not allowed to understand the…

I worded it exactly as intended when I said "meaningful achievement" instead of "wildest dream". If the scope of your ambition is to push the envelope in astrophysics, you probably already have enough resources at your disposal - and if you don't, a very sophisticated radio astronomy setup is easily within the reach of most individuals and certainly a handful of friends. But if your ambition is very specifically to b…

> If the scope of your ambition is to push the envelope in astrophysics, you probably already have enough resources at your disposal

That's pretty ridiculous. It takes a lot of excess financial capacity for a human to even develop such an ambition in the first place.

Even if you have that level of privilege, you have to compete for educational resources and social support against people who may have much more privilege than that.

Re: 22-year-old builds chips in his parents’ garage

#297

Post by DarylZero » Mon, Jan 24, 2022, 1:44 AM UTC

sennight wrote: post #155

quantumwannabe wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think what he is arguing is that someone with a negative attitude ("he can only do that because he's rich!") won't accomplish anything even if they were granted unlimited funding because they are focused on coming up with excuses instead of thinking about what they can do. There are plenty of poor people in third-world countries who have far less than the original commentator (who presumably lives in the first worl…

Put more bluntly than I was willing, but pretty much. I think this would be the case for the majority of the envious complaints, and the remainder would be a laughably unrealistic over-estimation of the power of money. As in: it doesn't suddenly make you smarter, more industrious, or gift you the ability to perform complex project management involving large organizations.

You're assuming someone isn't smart or industrious just because they grew up poor.

I think it's a self-serving assumption.

Re: 22-year-old builds chips in his parents’ garage

#298

Post by DarylZero » Mon, Jan 24, 2022, 1:46 AM UTC

Avamander wrote: post #24

xor99 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"One of Zeloof’s best finds was a broken electron microscope that cost $250,000 in the early ’90s; he bought it for $1,000 and repaired it."

A thousand dollars is an achievable amount of money for a smart kid in a poor family. I have had good friends from really poor families in Europe make more from bug bounty programs. If that's you're trying imply.

What if you couldn't fix it?

It wouldn't be smart to risk $1000 on a broken piece of equipment unless you had a lot more money to spare.

Re: 22-year-old builds chips in his parents’ garage

#299

Post by bsder » Mon, Jan 24, 2022, 2:24 AM UTC

ezconnect wrote: post #159

hnthrowaway0315 wrote: post #106

I'm more interested how he managed to master the knowledge of chip manufacturing plus a ton of electronics repairs (see his microscope and other equipment) at such an early age. Very admirable. Look at what he did: > Photolithography machines are expensive—up to $150 million—and so Zeloof made his own by bolting a modified conference room projector bought on Amazon onto a microscope. It projects his designs at tiny s…

He has support from his family.

His efforts are really cool.

However, that garage space alone is expensive. It's larger than many small hackerspaces.

I know of very few children who have access to that much lab/storage space all to themselves.

Re: 22-year-old builds chips in his parents’ garage

#300

Post by bradlys » Mon, Jan 24, 2022, 2:35 AM UTC

kkjjkgjjgg wrote: post #260

bradlys wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He went to CMU - I haven’t met someone who comes from a modest middle class family who went to CMU. I’m sure they exist but I haven’t found them and I’ve met quite a few grads. The guy comes from an affluent family. The privilege is obvious from a mile away. Still cool and all but in no way should anyone read this as a “oh, why wasn’t I able to do that” or “why aren’t more kids doing this?!” type of thing. It speaks…

So would you say it is worth shelling out money to go to CMU? What do they teach that others don't?

It's about signal - nothing else. It's a class signal. "I'm from the same class as you are - hiring manager. Now hire me. I'm not one of those dirty poors."