VCF SoCal | Feb 15 - 16 2025, | Hotel Fera, Orange CA |
VCF East | Apr 04 - 06 2025, | Infoage Museum, Wall NJ |
VCF Southwest | Jun 20 - 22 2025, | University of Texas at Dallas |
VCF Southeast | Jun 20 - 22 2025, | Atlanta, GA |
VCF West | Aug 2025, | CHM, Mountain View, CA |
VCF Midwest | Sep 13 - 14 2025, | Schaumburg, IL |
You don't need the tool, but you stand a 50% chance of breaking the socket without one, in my experience.
I never understood why PLCCs were strictly square. It always seemed to me that a rectangular shape would make orientation simpler. After all, most of the package is "dead space" for the leadframe.