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Kevin Hubbard

@khubbard.bsky.social
1.2K followers 263 following 345 posts

Electrical Engineer. ASICs, FPGAs, Python. Fan of convertibles and 6502 CPUs. Author of Mastering FPGA Chip Design : For Speed, Area, Power, and Reliability. Seattle,WA,US,Earth,Sol,MlkyWy blackmesalabs.wordpress.com

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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
I canceled my subscription to WaPo when Bezos bent the knee to Trump and never looked back.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 27/03/2026
I'd vote for //c as the peak 8bit Apple and the Mac SE/30 as the peak 32bit Apple. //gs was too little, too late. It's unfortunate they never made a //c in a Mac form-factor. That would have been cool.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 21/02/2026
buymeacoffee.com/bml_khubbard...
buymeacoffee.com
Kevin Hubbard
I'm a digital chip designer specializing in ASICs and FPGAs. While my day job involves complex silicon, my passion lies in the open-source EDA movement. I believe that the tools to build the future of
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 02/02/2026
Today I enhanced my Sump3 logic analyzer to let AI analyze millions of captured digital samples. A task far too time‑consuming for humans to tackle. In plain English, I asked "How many times does bsb_frm assert to logic-1 between the cursors". "10" It worked, first try, in spades. This is the way.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 01/02/2026
Don't know about Immich, but I love my Synology NAS drive! I store everything on it from my PCs and two Linux workstations. I love the peace of mind of having a Raid-1 Mirror. My 1st 2014 DS411 Slim lasted a decade. I replaced it with a DS225+ in 2025. Go $$ on drives. I got two WD's 1TB Red SSDs.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 22/01/2026
I actually got that. I must be getting old. Nobody gets my WW2 references anymore. Surrounded by children I am.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 11/12/2025
The thing for me with the 2nd election was this acceptance of "Well, this is what the Amerikan people really want in a leader." Sad, Scary, and also Democracy. I'm still left sitting in the back of the bus screaming of course. I've just learned to accept it.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 29/11/2025
I still believe Air Marshal Arthur Harris should have been on trial as well at Nuremberg.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 29/11/2025
There also should really be a Linus Torvalds status somewhere in the world by now.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 26/11/2025
I want Bullet Trains, but I'm definitely an outlier American on that.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
Yes. Hard to believe they also wrote "The City on the Edge of Forever"
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
One of those - "What did I just watch?" films.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
I'm in favor of free and fair elections. I guess that may make me a screaming liberal these days. So be it.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
On my bucket list! In the 1970's my family traveled Europe and the WW1 U-Boat at the Deutsches Museum in Munich left such an impact that I made sure to revisit in the 1990's while traveling to Israel for work. Truly amazing engineering for the time.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
Way Cool! Das Boot is one of my favorite books. The movie? Well, it's excellent too. www.amazon.com/Das-Boot-Boa...
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 23/11/2025
It hits home too. When "Carol" asks "Pirate Lady" (Zosia) a question, it reminds me of my daily correspondence with ChatGPT / Copilot AI LLM. The whole world collective knowledge through a single funnel.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 23/11/2025
I'm still very much enjoying it. The S1E3 hand grenade going off inside the house would have been more believable in terms of damage, but whatever. Rhea Seehorn is fantastic. After Better Call Saul, glad to see she landed star casting in her own show. Like Severance, it's new and fresh writing.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 22/11/2025
RE the book plate offer - still can't DM on either platforms. You appear to be blocked all around.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 17/11/2025
Thanks! For 2026, I'm attempting another manuscript. RISC-V System On Chip (SoC) design with Verilog and bare-metal C.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 16/11/2025
OMG - Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul are The Sopranos, The Wire, and Game of Thrones level of Television. Very much worth the time investment.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 16/11/2025
I wrote a book and managed to keep my day job. www.elektor.com/products/mas...
elektor.com
Mastering FPGA Chip Design (E-book)
This book teaches the fundamentals of FPGA operation, covering basic CMOS transistor theory to designing digital FPGA chips using LUTs, flip-flops, and embedded memories. Ideal for electrical engineer...
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 11/11/2025
I seem to recall a story about spending every last dime on a ferry ride to Nantucket or something to see friends with no means of getting to their house or paying for a return ferry home. Now that's how rich people travel.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 01/11/2025
Which gym, "24 Hour Fitness" maybe? I stopped "Anytime Fitness" when COVID hit. I'm just using the company gym these days, which is great. Lonely, but great.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 26/10/2025
A fallen tree was completely blocking my green-belt hiking path this morning. The funniest thing is there was no broken stump in sight. It's like the wind carried half a tree some distance.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
Global clock buffering is generally difficult to implement - when you turn off your main clock, who turns it back on? Regional clock buffering though is incredibly effective and easy to infer with modern synthesis tools. I make use of inferred regional clock buffering as much as possible.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 01/10/2025
The amount of load capacitance the clock input of a CMOS flip-flop represents. The C in CV^2F impacts power just as much as the F. It's easy to forget.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 29/09/2025
I enjoy the learning new things and fast-free writing blog stage. The final refinement into a book can be a grind. It's worth it at the very end of course.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 27/09/2025
System on Chip design in FPGA fabric using the RISC-V open-source CPU architecture out of UC Berkeley. Like my first book, it's starting out as an open-source blog series where I do all of my research and just free-write as fast as I can. Book comes after. blackmesalabs.wordpress.com/2025/08/31/b...
blackmesalabs.wordpress.com
BML Designing RISC-V SoCs with FPGAs : Part-Intro
Table of Contents:Part-1 : What are SoCs?Part-2 : History of Modern Computer ArchitecturePart-3 : RISC-V Assembly LanguagePart-4 : RISC-V and the Femto corePart-5 : Femto-CPU Memory AccessPart-6 : …
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 26/09/2025
I did a YouTube podcast with Brian Tristam Williams of Elektor Publishing this week. Discussed my new book "Mastering FPGA Chip Design : For Speed, Area, Power, and Reliability" and also technology progression from 1970s to present day. It was fun and would do again. www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2xi...
youtube.com
Mastering FPGA Chip Design with Kevin Hubbard — EEI #56
YouTube video by Elektor TV
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 26/09/2025
Thank you. It feels fantastic! There are, of course, some things I would like to slightly change - as seeings things on paper versus a computer screen is a bit different. Water under the bridge though. I'll make those improvements on my second book!
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 03/08/2025
Very sorry for your loss. Pets are such special family members.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 06/07/2025
My book just showed up in the wild, in Germany! I am still waiting for my print copy to cross the big pond. I've only ever seen my original PDF manuscript, so this is very exciting. A REAL BOOK! It's about $35 for print or eBook versions. I worked very hard on this. www.elektor.com/products/mas...
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 02/07/2025
Thank you!
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 02/07/2025
Thank you!!
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 02/07/2025
Hi Darcy, I am thinking you may have left Twitter for good. I just can't imagine why ( sarcasm ). I wanted to share that my book is finally out and a huge thanks to you for all of the AsciiDoc help last year that made it all possible. Thank You. Merci beaucoup. www.elektor.com/products/mas...
elektor.com
Mastering FPGA Chip Design
This book teaches the fundamentals of FPGA operation, covering basic CMOS transistor theory to designing digital FPGA chips using LUTs, flip-flops, and embedded memories. Ideal for electrical engineer...
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 02/07/2025
Today I purchased four copies of my book for four Electrical Engineering professors at the University of Washington. One was my professor way back in the early 1990s. The other three currently teach FPGA courses. Money well spent. Very gratifying. Giving back. www.elektor.com/products/mas...
elektor.com
Mastering FPGA Chip Design (E-book)
This book teaches the fundamentals of FPGA operation, covering basic CMOS transistor theory to designing digital FPGA chips using LUTs, flip-flops, and embedded memories. Ideal for electrical engineer...
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 02/07/2025
In grade-school, middle-school and even early high-school, I dreamt of attending MIT to get a degree in Electrical Engineering. It just wasn't in the cards and I attended University of Washington. So glad I did. Everything worked out smashingly in the end. Serendipity.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 01/07/2025
Link to eBook (PDF) version www.elektor.com/products/mas...
elektor.com
Mastering FPGA Chip Design (E-book)
This book teaches the fundamentals of FPGA operation, covering basic CMOS transistor theory to designing digital FPGA chips using LUTs, flip-flops, and embedded memories. Ideal for electrical engineer...
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 30/06/2025
Thank you! It's such a relief ( and sense of accomplishment ) to have finally finished it.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 30/06/2025
I’ve completed my year-long journey to becoming a published author in electrical engineering. Mastering FPGA Chip Design: For Speed, Area, Power, and Reliability is now part of the Elektor Academy Pro series and available in both print and eBook formats: www.elektor.com/products/mas...
elektor.com
Mastering FPGA Chip Design
This book teaches the fundamentals of FPGA operation, covering basic CMOS transistor theory to designing digital FPGA chips using LUTs, flip-flops, and embedded memories. Ideal for electrical engineer...
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 13/05/2025
Sorry to hear. Hope you find something better soon.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 13/04/2025
Smother it with some butter and bacon. Trust me on this.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 31/03/2025
Thank you!
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 31/03/2025
Today I finished the last chapter on my manuscript. 28 chapters, 310 pages. It's been quite the year long journey. It's the one book that I have in me. I really hope it turns out well. Even if it doesn't, I know I gave it my best. It has been a personal and professional journey well worth taking.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 29/03/2025
I'm $200 a month richer and so much happier. $60/month for internet and maybe $20 for a couple of streaming services with ads. Oh - and my @tablotv.bsky.social - Love my free local channels streaming from my Tablo to my Roku!
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 09/03/2025
I call him "Sprite-Man" - yeah he's a bit creepy, I still love him. 16x32 pixels at RGB 3:3:3 color depth in a single FPGA RAM. He's part of my VGA graphics controller project. Instead of 512 CPU writes to draw "Sprite-Man", a single CPU write will relocate him anywhere on the 1280x1024 display.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 03/03/2025
Finally got my frame buffer working. Very RAM limited on this chip so it is 320x256 at 9 bits even though the hardware DACs are 1280x1024 12 bits. Side-by-side of my FPGA 9bit frame buffer versus original image at 24 bits RGB.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 01/03/2025
Color text on my VGA graphics controller on a @digilent.bsky.social BASYS3 board! 1280x1024 with a 108 MHz dot clock. 4Kx18 RAM (72Kb, 2 BRAMs) for 80x32 text with 18 bits per text character. 8 bits for ASCII ROM. 5 bits each for Foreground and Background luminance(2) and color(3). Yay - It works!
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 24/02/2025
This took all day. So frustrating. Backtracked a whole bunch trying to conserve BRAMs. Going to try and add some foreground color next with all the wasted BRAM bits. "Hello World!" digital style in 1280x1024 analog VGA.
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Kevin Hubbard @khubbard.bsky.social · 23/02/2025
Analog VGA could have been over a 5-conductor TRRS 3.5mm headphone jack! I suppose the single return may have created some issues.
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