Just graduated with a Bachelor's degree in Electronics and Telecommunications.
Was wondering whether should I get enrollment with a Masters's Degree in embedded systems.

Would that help in reverse engineering pursuits and future data recovery aspects?

What's say, Gurus!!!!

let me know!

it would... 'help', but imagine the distraction of having coursework to do. A faster way would be to get in and do RE now.

You start, find a bit you are stuck on and just research it until you solve it.

BTW, a degree in software engineering did NOT help in reverse engineering software. That came from many, many hours of tutorials and stepping through code with debuggers and disassemblers.

i think it is hard to judge if it helped or not, coz you had it. Of course it is not the degree that helps but having some background in sw development definitely helps, especially if it is something like C and assembly, not to mention microcontrollers...

pepe

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Adatmentés - Data recovery
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Mine is also worthless but it came from a time when it was the "right thing" to do. I really wish I'd have spent the time vocationally rather then educationally and I'd have retired long ago. Things move very fast in IT generally and DR is no exception; having your attention split between your own research and education will leave you steps behind your completion. If you have the correct mind set for self study and that's all that is needed, what value is a certificate other than to show a protentional employer.

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Properly, Quickly, Cheaply - Pick any two.

I think the masters would broaden your horizons and be more fulfilling if you are doing it for the love of what you are studying, not just to become a better DR engineer.

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DR has a finite life. Think about life after DR.

If I had my time over again, I think I would enjoy a career where I could combine electronic design with firmware development.

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A backup a day keeps DR away.

Hey Gurus! sorry for the delayed response. Was held up firstly with getting a vaccine jab....Zeneca gave me 104deg fever and body aches...Now I am fully recovered from the first dose. (was fun)

Then I happen to give HAM radio license exams results are to be declared

These are some thoughts that are going into my head. Self-study vs getting advanced degree w.r.t short life span of DR field (maybe 12-15 years more in India?? )

I am currently doing ok with C and Python. Extremely freehand with analog and digital electronics.
On the way to Assembly so so....
Can program with STM32 boards easily with their libraries. However, i have not got my hands dirty at triggering registers and setting up a project without thier cubemx app.. so yeah...theres lot to learn.


Here in India, apparently, there are very few institutes that offer embedded systems in general. We have Masters in Electronics and Telecom and Another master in Computer Science.... Both require me to clear a common entrance test which is called GATE exam (try to google GATE questions for Computer science or elec and teleco) The syllabus is WIDE and DEEP...Gearing up for the same and giving a shot.

Was wondering if there are any courses abroad that focus mainly on Embedded Systems or Reverse Engineering.

Life is short and confusing hahaha
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I did this one https://azeria-labs.com/

many others

https://www.pentesteracademy.com/course?id=49

https://zygosec.com/post1.html

you should be able to find the video to this: https://www.blackhat.com/presentations/bh-europe-04/bh-eu-04-dehaas/bh-eu-04-dehaas.pdf

https://www.riscure.com/training/arm-reverse-engineering

https://github.com/mytechnotalent/Reverse-Engineering

https://www.wiley.com/en-au/Practical+Reverse+Engineering:+x86,+x64,+ARM,+Windows+Kernel,+Reversing+Tools,+and+Obfuscation-p-9781118787311

You did already google for this stuff right??

Hi HaQue, thanks for all the links.
Some of the links I had seen before.
Specially riscure and the pdf. Had also contacted them a month ago or so to know more.

I am getting hands on the book that you recommended.
Apparently, i found out a few links on MIT OCW (open courseware) about Assembly tutorials and would follow the same
https://ocw.mit.edu/search/ocwsearch.ht ... 20language

So primitively, to get the hands dirty, would phones/modems and other such devices be the first candidates to tinker with ?? Starting off directly with HDDs would be way more than i can chew i feel at times!

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Working on it

Phones are quite different architecturally, so I wouldnt waste too much time in a different domain. If you want to work on HDDs, perhaps start with older HDDs with less protection mechanisms?

one word of advice.. Don't just collect a million bits of teachings/books/pdf's on a subject you are interested in.. actually read them, understand them and do the courses, no matter how simple or free they are. I have folders apon folders of any tech subject you can think of, but rarely put in the time to actually study much of it, apart from a handful!

Also, try and find a useful application of something you want to learn. example - if you want to learn programming in a certain language, try and think of something you nedd or someone needs, and develop it, learning along the way. If you pick a generic thing that is useless, but try and use it as a programming project, I doubt you would finish.. it just doesn't "feel" worthwhile to do it. If you don't "feel" it, you won't do it.

Quite INTP

like-wise. However, I am revising C again about 60 pages a day... picked up x86 assembly.... Let me see how well can i put my licensed IDA to use now Wish me luck


one last q.... should I try coding nucleo base boards with ASM or should i try to procure a 8051 dev board?

PS
I think I am going ahead and doing a masters....Entrance exams in feb 2022

I mean, i am starting off an Audio Synth/Sequencer project using MCUs.... so lot of SPI interfacing here and there with NCOs like AD9833....AD/DA stuff...so far been using HAL by ST....should I tinker with ASM instead? Was wondering if I should do the same with 8bit MCUs just to control a few peripherals...I am sure 8bits wont be enough to provide a large octave range for CVs.


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Noted master. Let me dig up the old dusty drives in Dads inventory 20GB 80GB etc

<3

I guess it depends on a) your personal goal, and
b) how long you want to take to get there.

example, if your goal is to travel to china, and be able to communicate there well, you could either go do 4 years of a Chinese language training and become a master at their language, culture etc, or do some online courses covering the most common basics in a few weeks.

as always "it depends" does a lot of heavy lifting here.

you might go there after becoming a master and learn that fo the most part, people can communicate sufficiently in English for you to get through your 2 week holiday, and your masters was a 'little' overkill.

IMHO, disassembling 20GB drives firmware may provide some entertainment, but for much use in the future, I am not sure.

Also a casual observation may conclude that with the plans you have already, you may not have time for a whole lot else.

Once you define some real world goals, the path to it is a LOT easier to see.

Correct. Absolutely.