5 ms·

Yeah, some chips had ESD protection, a lot of the early ones did not. You treated bare chips with care, used an ESD mat when working with boards, grounded yours

by kabdib 4y ago

Yeah, some chips had ESD protection, a lot of the early ones did not. You treated bare chips with care, used an ESD mat when working with boards, grounded yourself with a wrist strap, and were realllly careful in non-lab spaces (where there were usually carpets, waiting to pounce). Still zapped stuff. Ugh. I still have a habit of touching likely grounds from time to time whenever I'm in a lab.

anyfoo 4y ago
> I still have a habit of touching likely grounds from time to time whenever I'm in a lab. Me too, it's such an ingrained habit. Before touching any "open electronics", I quickly touch the earth lug on my lab PSU, or a screw from some other (grounded) metal test equipment case. I've been doing it so long and so consistently that my hands feel "wrong" before I do that. So much stuff has ESD protection nowadays, but some individual components at least still don't, and you only need to break one part to ruin your day (or at least some significant amount of time if you're so lucky that you can solder a replacement).
analog31 4y ago
Likewise here. With the back of my hand, another old habit. Chips are more robust today, but not 100%, and some specialized devices like laser diodes are super sensitive to ESD. The most evil thing are those plastic mats that people put over carpet in their offices so they can roll their rolling chairs. That's like sitting on a van de graaf generator. I killed several valuable EPROMs at my first job out of school, sitting at my desk, programming, then went to touch a chip to program it, ZAP! When chips are in circuit boards, they're much less sensitive, due to the capacitance of the board traces. It's been a long time since I worried about handling a board. Of course the cost and irreplaceability of the board figures into the risk calculation.

5 ms·

Yeah, some chips had ESD protection, a lot of the early ones did not. You treated bare chips with care, used an ESD mat when working with boards, grounded yours

by kabdib 4y ago

anyfoo 4y ago
> I still have a habit of touching likely grounds from time to time whenever I'm in a lab. Me too, it's such an ingrained habit. Before touching any "open electronics", I quickly touch the earth lug on my lab PSU, or a screw from some other (grounded) metal test equipment case. I've been doing it so long and so consistently that my hands feel "wrong" before I do that. So much stuff has ESD protection nowadays, but some individual components at least still don't, and you only need to break one part to ruin your day (or at least some significant amount of time if you're so lucky that you can solder a replacement).
analog31 4y ago
Likewise here. With the back of my hand, another old habit. Chips are more robust today, but not 100%, and some specialized devices like laser diodes are super sensitive to ESD. The most evil thing are those plastic mats that people put over carpet in their offices so they can roll their rolling chairs. That's like sitting on a van de graaf generator. I killed several valuable EPROMs at my first job out of school, sitting at my desk, programming, then went to touch a chip to program it, ZAP! When chips are in circuit boards, they're much less sensitive, due to the capacitance of the board traces. It's been a long time since I worried about handling a board. Of course the cost and irreplaceability of the board figures into the risk calculation.