CESH 100 Electronics and PCB Reverse Engineering Concepts

Concepts · 3 days · Not assessed

About the course

Every deeper course in the family builds on this one, so it covers the ground the others take for granted.

Your people start with bench safety and the shared vocabulary, then learn to read a board properly: electrical fundamentals, power delivery, multilayer design, schematics and datasheets. They cover component and feature identification, the main chip families and why a designer reaches for each, and how to prioritise where the value sits on an unknown board.

From there it moves to external recon and imaging, finding interfaces, test points and buses, and getting honest readings from a multimeter and logic analyser. They also get a first run at firmware extraction, soldering, chip-off, glitching and power analysis, enough to know what each rung involves before committing to it.

Want to know what to expect in the classroom? Find out more about our training approach and how we turn technical concepts into practical, hands-on skills.

Skills and topics covered

This list shows the various main topics we cover during the course:

Bench safety and RE terminology
Reading schematics and datasheets
Power delivery and multilayer board design
Component and chip-family identification
Analysis prioritisation on unknown boards
External recon and board imaging
Locating test points, interfaces and buses
Multimeter and logic analyser use
First-pass firmware extraction
Soldering and chip-off fundamentals
First-pass glitching and power analysis

What will a new trainee gain?

A trainee leaves able to look at an unfamiliar board and describe what it is, how it is powered and where its interesting interfaces are, rather than feeling lost in front of unmarked silicon. It gives your new entrants a shared vocabulary and a working method, so they can contribute to real RE work from their first weeks rather than spending months finding their feet.

What will an experienced team member gain?

An experienced engineer gets a structured, common framework that turns scattered habits into a repeatable pipeline the rest of the team can follow. It also fills the gaps people quietly carry, the rung they have never had to touch, so your seniors can mentor across the whole discipline rather than just their own corner.

Who this course is for

There are no formal prerequisites, but the Electronics and PCB Reverse Engineering Concepts course is highly technical. Experience of hardware concepts is useful but not needed. The course is designed to build good foundational knowledge first and then dig into increasingly interesting stuff as the days progress.

Not sure where you fit? Find out more about our training audience and prerequisites.

As someone who used to take things apart as a kid just to see how they worked (and usually got told off for it), this course hit the spot. If you’re the same – curious, technical, and always asking how does this actually work? – then you’ll love it. Highly recommended for anyone serious about hardware hacking, reverse engineering, or just unlocking that next level of cyber knowledge.

Jon from Baigent’s Information Security Services

This was a fantastic introduction to Hardware in general. Whether you’re interested in security, RE or just curious about how things work on a hardware level, this is a fantastic hands-on course!

Davey H

Required equipment, tools, and software

You will need a laptop with at least 8GB RAM preferably 16GB, an up to date and stable Operating System, and an Ethernet port / reliable Ethernet dongle.

This laptop must be fully under your control such that you can install tools, dependencies and run arbitrary code. It is often useful to have the ability to run virtual machines and any that we provide will be suitable for importing into VirtualBox. If you use a different hypervisor, ensure that you are confident about importing VMs from OVF file formats. Unfortunately we are unable to pause the course for technical difficulties as a result of the amount of material that we need to cover.

We will use a number of other tools during the course. We put together a goodie bag which directly relates to the activities in the course. The free goodie bag is yours to keep at the end of the course, just make sure you have enough luggage space to take it home. The exact details of what is in it will vary depending on availability but we always make it a useful and interesting collection. We provide any other tools needed to complete all the tasks set, aside from a laptop.

You don’t need to bring anything extra other than your enthusiasm!

Venue and travel information

The classroom

The classroom is well appointed, has good WiFi and hot and cold drinks, it’s spacious, comfortable, has plenty of power sockets, lots of natural light, and is wheelchair friendly. The course is delivered in English and digital versions of slides and handouts will be provided where appropriate.

Food and refreshments

Lunch and morning and afternoon snacks are provided so please make sure you let us know about any dietary needs at least a week before we get started. With the exception of the social night, all other meals are for you to organise. We suggest getting a hotel that provides breakfast, and there are many good restaurants in Manchester for your evening meals. We will try and facilitate additional social arrangements, but, this is down to the individuals present.

Staying in Manchester

There are a number of good and affordable hotels in the Manchester area. We are based in an area called Media City and we are in the same complex as the northern headquarters of the BBC. This means that there are lots of facilities locally and you could choose to not venture into the city centre.

Getting here

If you do choose to look further around there are good tram links that can take you into the city as well as to key travel hubs such as Piccadilly, the national railway station, and Manchester International Airport.

Please check the weather before you travel and bring suitable clothes for the season. If in doubt, assume you will need a waterproof coat and an umbrella. The locals will tell you that Manchester is one of the rainiest places in the world, its not actually true but it does drizzle more than you might expect, even in summer.

Ready to start your hardware reverse engineering training?

Build the practical knowledge and confidence to approach unfamiliar electronics and PCBs methodically. Over three days, you’ll develop a strong grounding in the tools, terminology and techniques used across hardware reverse engineering, giving you a solid foundation for more advanced training.

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