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With each new PCB design, there comes a time when you must make decisions based on more than performance alone. Physical space is easily overlooked in the world of equations, schematics, and oscilloscopes—we'll often focus on signal integrity over such mundanities as component volume. In the days of room-filling computers, we didn’t have to be deliberate with our space. However, cost, time and space requirements have obviously changed. There is...

Have you ever planned an airline trip where there isn’t a direct flight to get you to your destination? I have, and as you probably already know, it isn’t a problem. I use the travel planner on my airline’s website and let it figure out every detail of the trip for me. All I have to do is plug in my origin and destination, and the planner determines my itinerary—with enough time to make my connections. It’s a piece of cake. Can you imagine how...

In the town where I live there is this lady who is a magician with a sewing machine. She is in charge of the wardrobes for the high school musicals and is a whiz at taking costumes from old shows, and reusing them for new productions. Sometimes she alters the older costumes, and sometimes she simply uses them the way they already are. In the show this year, the evil queen is wearing a flamboyant dress that is actually an altered version of a...

Recently I helped with a plumbing problem at my mother-in-law’s house. A fixture had started to leak and water was going everywhere. As she thought about it for a while, mom realized that she had been living there for 25 years and had never replaced this fixture. The old part had now failed though, and needed to be replaced. However, trying to find a modern replacement part that would fit turned out to be an even bigger problem. It’s one of...

Everybody has those lazy moments, trying to figure out how little one can do while still completing a task. In my first job, I created software where I can automatically launch my favorite applications through voice commands. Later, I found a new level by coding a special program to email reports, close applications, and shut down my computer with one click of a button. My first PCB designs took place on the early versions of PCB design...

When I’m designing a new PCB or product one of the hardest parts for me is choosing exactly which components I should use. It seems like every technology out there now has a different configuration to achieve the best performance. Even when you’re dealing with a fairly straightforward technology like radio frequency identification (RFID) circuit board there are a lot of flavors to choose from. While every type of RFID design label uses an active...

            On Track Newsletter November 2017 VOL. 1 No 8   Welcome to the November edition of Altium’s On Track Newsletter. This month in Rock Stars and Superheroes we feature a who presented a talk at AltiumLive 2017: ANNUAL PCB DESIGN SUMMIT in San Diego. Not only is he a very talented , he is a leader and advocate for regional Altium® User Groups and shares how to start and build your own. In Space you’ll meet an...