To My Readers



If this is the first time you're visiting my blog, thank you. Whether you're interested or just curious to find out about PCB reverse engineering (PCB-RE), I hope you'll find something useful here.

This blog contains many snippets of the content in my books to provide a more detailed overall sampling for my would-be readers to be better informed before making the purchase. Of course, the book contains more photos and nice illustrations, as evidence from its cover page. Hopefully, this online trailer version will whet your appetite enough to want to get a copy for yourself.

Top Review

I started doing component level repair of electronics with (and without) schematics more than 40 years ago, which activity often involves reverse-engineering of printed circuit boards. Although over the years my technical interests have shifted into particle beam instrumentation, electron microscopy, and focused ion beam technology fields, till this day——and more often than not——PCB repairs have returned multiple multi-million-dollar accelerators, FIB, and SEM instruments back to operation, delivering great satisfaction and some profit.

Many of the methods described by Keng Tiong in great details are similar to the approaches I've developed, but some of the techniques are different, and as effective and useful as efficient and practical. Systematic approach and collection of useful information presented in his books are not only invaluable for a novice approaching PCB-level reverse engineering, but also very interesting reading and hands-on reference for professionals.

Focus on reverse engineering instead of original design provides unique perspective into workings of electronics, and in my opinion books by Keng Tiong (I've got all three of them) are must-read for anybody trying to develop good understanding of electronics——together with writings by Paul Horowitz and Winfield Hill, Phil Hobbs, Jim Williams, Bob Pease, Howard Johnson and Martin Graham, Sam Goldwasser, and other world's top electronics experts.

Valery Ray
Particle Beam Systems Technologist

Tuesday, October 22, 2019

Manual PCB-RE: Equipment & Tools

Every trade has its expert, and every master craftsman has his tools. PCB-RE engineers are no exception, more so when it comes to doing PCB-RE manually. In my fifteen years of experience reverse engineering printed circuit boards (PCB) and modular electronic units, I've come to appreciate the importance of having a good set of tools on hand to get the job done. Not just the basic toolkit, but the essential ones.

A typical electronics workbench setup (courtesy of Mitch Haile)

If you want to do serious manual PCB-RE, whether in a workshop setting of your employment or in the comfort of your own workspace at home, some form of electronic equipment and hand tools are indispensable. Depending on how comprehensive a level of PCB-RE you intend to engage in, it will determine the outcome of your inventory and acquisition. Generally, there are four categories to consider:

 1. Hand and power tools
 2. Instrumentation
 3. PCB-related equipment
 4. Diagramming tool

The first three are hardware and safety related while the fourth is software, though strictly speaking, the line of distinction is not that concise in some cases.
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