I took a Microprocessors course in college (University of Florida) where in the lab you build up an entire board from scratch...including soldering each chip an

I took a Microprocessors course in college (University of Florida) where in the lab you build up an entire board from scratch...including soldering each chip and component. You need to essentially program the drivers from scratch, using assembly...at the end your board has inputs and outputs like a speaker, switches, keypad, infrared remote control...everything was in assembly and you need to RTFM to know how each chip...pin out, clocks etc work. It gives you a great knowledge and appreciate of what goes on beneath the covers. It was a grueling, but satisfying class.