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Making RAM at Home [video]

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Re: Making RAM at Home [video]

#42

So, I get that we charge the capacitor up, and that it leaks so we must recharge it periodically. I don't get two things: 1. How is the value read? Is it reading the leak? 2. How is recharging done? I guess the leak itself (assuming my guess in 1. holds) could provide charge for some logic that checks "if has charge then recharge else nop". I still don't really get transistors :P, but this was cool.

A transistor effectively is an AND gate. If there is a charge on both the source and the gate, then charge can move to drain. So if you charge up the capacitor and you connect it to the source of another transistor then you can check whether it is still charged by putting a charge to the gate and see if there is charge on the drain.

And you are right, that charge on the drain can then be used both to drive some logic and to activate the recharging of the capacitor that was just discharged.

By the way I am being handwavy about "charge" moving about, if you really want to learn the electronics it is more correct to call it a voltage relative to some ground that the charge always moves towards.

Re: Making RAM at Home [video]

#45

I only buy free-range artisanal DRAM at the DRAM farmer's market.

Admit it, deep down, our inner engeering child also wants to build a semiconductor clean room ;)

I do but my days in the fab taught me that you do NOT want people to do this, considering the extremely dangerous chemicals involved. People have died changing EMPTY tanks of phosphine gas used for doping… and HF acid used for etch is another nightmare entirely.

Re: Making RAM at Home [video]

#46
post #12
post #5

I saw this video yesterday and considered posting it, but I wasn’t sure if it was appropriate for HN. This channel has another video where it shows how the clean room lab is created starting from a basic backyard shed, and that was truly astounding. The positive pressure to keep the number of particles low in someone’s backyard is almost mystical to me.

If you haven't seen this one, I highly recommend it: Indistinguishable From Magic: Manufacturing Modern Computer Chips https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGFhc8R_uO4&t=2070s It's quite old but I think there is no modern version of it. I've tried posting to HN a few times but it hasn't gained traction for some reason, but I find it absolutely mind blowing.

Videos in general don’t get much traction here. Most of the time I don’t want to watch them in this context either, when other sites I do.

Maybe it’s just I come here for the old web feel when video was costly, rare and short.

Re: Making RAM at Home [video]

#47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re not sure if someone building a RAM clean room in a shed is appropriate for HackerNews, literally “news for nerds”? A dictionary purchase may be warranted

I think he plans to go far beyond just making RAM in that clean room. This is pure speculation, but I suspect the goal of that channel is to just make doom from scratch. Given that the shed in this guy’s backyard is already approaching the entire national technological output of any country in the 1970s I think he may get there.

In a comment he says he is doing it for some research into a related thing (somethiing to do with GaN sheets?)

Re: Making RAM at Home [video]

#48

This guy is proof that newcomers to YouTube can still succeed, if they find the right niche.

Is it? Looks like this video is "locked" on Patreon requiring "this post and more exclusive work. Join for $10/month" yet got, as of now, 329 611 views ... so are they just making $3M/month or is it not really working?

Re: Making RAM at Home [video]

#49

I'm not sure this is what they meant when they said they wanted to bring manufacturing back to the USA lol

Chairman Trump will have a semiconductor furnace in every backyard.

You have to surrender your silicon(e) to the state!
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