As for my desk, it is covered with papers, books, a pen, a card reader, 2 screwdrivers, a Vernier caliper and a multimeter. Soemothe rthings too, but I can’t see them.

I built my own, from scratch, controller for a programmable power supply back in 1985, wirewrapped on three 6″x12″ (?) boards. Lesson learned was never rely on other people to do good work. I let my project partners wire up two of the boards. They came back hopeless – one was wired backwards, so it had to be completely redone – both were riddled with errors. I should have just done it myself. A few months later I redesigned the whole thing using a Z80 as the controller.