Feeling motivated and inspired by the recent LNA and PA successes, I now must get the VGA working. The previous two proto boards were a bit of a mess so, since I needed some stepper motor controller boards made for another project, I thought that a nice tidy board would help me figure out how to use it.

The device in question is the HMC742A VGA chip and after spending a bit more time studying the datasheet I feel 90% confident I can get it to work. Soldering the chip is a problem for me as the pitch is a tiny 0.5 mm and there's a massive GND paddle right in the middle of it. Fear not ..... I do have my

https://hackaday.io/project/20260-manual-smt-pick-and-place-machine

which is fully operational.

Here's some of the board design pics - not the prettiest looking boards in the world: