Five Tips Guaranteed to Reduce PCB Design Time Most engineers and PCB designers are creatures of habit. Once a roadmap has been prepared for creating successful products, that is the road most often traveled. We often don’t have the time to experiment with new techniques or look for new, innovative ways to accomplish tasks, and while that is not always a bad thing, it does not bode well if our competitors are creating successful products faster and cheaper than we are. To maintain your Read Article Net Clearance Rules Designers now have the ability to set specific parameters between same net objects when placing primitives on a board. Restricting space allows you to maintain clearance for primitives, and restricting primitives of the same net to a set clearance ultimately allows greater flexibility when forcing electrical primitives to interact with other electrical objects in a specific manner. INTRODUCTION Clearance rules set requirement constraints that Read Article Which is Better in PCB Design: Polygons or Planes? PCB designers have two choices when implementing large copper areas for power and ground regions: polygons or planes. Users often ask which is better in PCB designs, a polygon or a plane for implementing power and ground nets, but both design features produce similar end results. Once you’ve decided which type of structure is most useful in your PCB polygon layout, you can place the structure you need for your design using the right set of CAD Read Article Not That Much Force: Software for Updating PCB Layouts and Avoiding Redesigns The other night I went to see the new Star Wars movie, “The Last Jedi," and although I really enjoyed the movie I found myself laughing out loud during one sequence. I wasn’t laughing because of the humor of the movie, or a silly looking alien—there were plenty of those to go around already. Instead I was laughing because for one brief sequence they showed some electronic circuitry that appeared to be composed of what looked like thru-hole Read Article The Best PCB Component Placement Software Helps You to Efficiently Finish Your Placement Remember when we were kids and our parents gave us permission to do something fun but first we had to finish our chores? Now, taking out the garbage, folding clothes, and mowing the grass I’d prefer compared to budgeting for vacations or renovating bathrooms. Getting the chores completed lets me move on to something that is at least significantly more convenient and in many cases more fun. When I’m designing, I have similar chore preferences and Read Article Pass The Baton Well to PCB Design Successors Have you ever walked into a new job, first-day energy rolling through your shoulders, only to sit down and look at the notes left from the person who last had your job and know exactly what the problem was: poor organization. Poor organization is usually pretty noticeable in any work process; however, it takes on its most detrimental final form when you are trying to train someone based on the poorly organized leftovers of someone else. Early in Read Article No More Wrong Ports: Implementing USB Devices In Your Hardware Design I keep having what I like to call “Grouchy Old Man Thoughts” (GOMT). You know the type: “Why do I have to learn this new thing if what I have works for me?” or, “I wonder what it’d be like to have a conversation without them being on their phone half the time.” Well, my most recent GOMT has been that I think anyone born after the 90s is pretty lucky, technologically. They didn’t have to go through the painstaking phase before Universal Serial Read Article High Speed Tips and Tricks Click the PDF above to read more about High Speed Design in this presentation. Or read the original, full-length content here: Introduction to High Speed PCB Designing: Is FR-4 the Best Board Material Choice for High Speed PCB Design? Board Layer Stackup Considerations for High Speed Board Design High Speed PCB Design Considerations: Component Shape Considerations High Speed PCB Design Considerations: Bypass Capacitor Place and Route Tips High Read Article Collaborative PCB Design PCB Design is a complex field and every step you take to design and develop a board has its own set of best practices. But what will truly move the needle in your design process? Collaborative tools that keep your team not only focused but in the flow. Altium has pioneered collaborative design for EDA tools because Altium PCB design tools start each iteration with ultimate productivity in mind. Join us in an exploration of collaborative PCB Read Article Best PCB Design Tips PCB Design is a complex field and it always pays to learn from other's mistakes so you can avoid repeating history. Here we have brought together a small collection of insights to help inform your design process. From implementing WDTs in your board design to determining components we want you to stand on the shoulders of giants when it comes to improving your design and yielding better results. Click the PDF above to read more about Best PCB Read Article The Best PCB Routing Software Helps You to Finish Your Design on Time When my first child was young, my wife and I didn’t have a lot of income. It took everything that we had to pay the rent and put food on the table. When it came time for Christmas I really wanted to buy my boy a present, but I didn’t have any extra money to spend. That was a really humbling moment when I couldn’t even afford an extra couple of bucks for a toy. Fortunately, my wife had been saving money all along in preparation for Christmas. When Read Article 9:06 What are Embedded Passives/Actives and how to use them? In this Episode, John Magyar is talking about Embedded Components and the Differences between SMT Passive, SMT Active, Embedded Passive and Embedded Active. Learn more about Embedded Components and how to use them. Please leave your comment and share this video with fellow Engineers. See All OnTrack Newsletters here. Watch Video Don’t Just Resolve Your New Year, (PCB) Design It History contains many valuable lessons to learn, but this is the time of year when many people consider the future. You deserve some congratulations for going through your 2017: you learned new designs, tackled challenges, and did everything in your power to make 2017 your most successful year yet. The only thing left for 2018 is reaching higher and accomplishing even more. Don’t let yesteryear’s success limit your current ambition; keep pushing Read Article Auto-Interactive Routing In the past, many PCB designers would shy away from using autorouters in their designs due to their penchant for difficult setups and questionable results. This led to many of us opting for manual hand routing to avoid the trouble and clean up. However, recent developments in auto-routing technology have allowed for a lot of saved time and effort in your design process. Click the PDF above to read more about Auto-Interactive Routing in this ebook Read Article Bill of Materials for PCB: Part Numbering Systems and Organization, or Packing Tetris? It would be great if spending a day at the beach didn’t require gathering towels and chairs, fixing lunch, and making sure there was enough sunscreen to go around. Swimsuit selection, packing up, and traveling are also unpleasant chores. It would be nice to just think “beach” while sitting on the couch, and suddenly be comfortably working on a tan with your toes in the sand. That’s the thing about organization though; it’s what really gets us Read Article Order Up! Finding Your Chef Voice in Mixed Voltage PCB Design I was watching a cooking program on television the other day when I noticed how chefs always seem to be yelling whenever they need something or are demanding another kitchen staff to do something. It started to dawn on me how much of a mixture a kitchen has to be: there have to be all sorts of people who are both capable of being quiet and listening, and being loud and giving orders when something needs to get done. When you stop to consider all Read Article Guidelines for PCB Design PCB Design is a complex field and every step you take to design and develop a board has its own set of best practices to help you determine the best solutions for your pending puzzle. Read on for more information about guidelines from across the spectrum of PCB design disciplines. We hope these PCB design guidelines will help you in your next project. Click the PDF above to read more about Guidelines for PCB Design in this presentation. Or read Read Article Pagination First page « First Previous page ‹‹ Page159 Current page160 Page161 Page162 Page163 Page164 Next page ›› Last page Last » Load More
