Chris Carlson's Time Saving Tips for PCB Design In this podcast episode, Chris Carlson, Senior Field Application Engineer at Altium, shares the kind of indispensable PCB design tips & tricks one can only get with 23-years of experience! Watch now! Read Article PCB Current Transformers: How To Project If you need to measure the current from an AC source, a current transformer can be a low cost, accurate option. You can find current transformers designed specifically for anything between 50/60Hz power line applications and much higher frequencies that are more suitable for industrial/scientific machinery or process monitoring. Current transformers are non-contact and non-invasive, meaning that you do not need to run AC power through your Read Article Differences Between Prepreg Material vs. PCB Core: What Designers Need to Know I sometimes get questions from designers that want to know more about the PCB material selection and manufacturing process. Although I’m not a manufacturer, it behooves designers to understand something about the materials they have available when working on a new project. One question I get is on the exact differences between PCB core vs. prepreg materials. The terms are sometimes used interchangeably, including by novice designers; I’ll admit I Read Article The Importance of Having A Modern PCB Manufacturing Data Format I recently posted a BLOG on Altium about the latest eSmart Factory in New Hampshire. Using the latest in State-of-the-Art machinery and processes, it can produce near-perfect complex multilayers and HDI substrates with extremely fine geometries in only a few days, and without ever being helped or touched by human hands, all while and emitting nothing to harm the environment—zero effluents. Digitization for the Smart Factory This technology will Read Article The eSmart Factory Comes to PCB Fabrication We all talk about the Industrial Revolution. The world has gone through a number of “Industrial Revolutions” since the creation of steam power in England. In fact, we talk about three such revolutions since that first one. In the early 2010s, the German Government proposed a fourth industrial revolution they called INDUSTRU 4.0. Today we also call it “The Smart Factory”! But, to date, there hasn’t been too much reported progress in this program Read Article Can You Hear Me Now? Depending on your background and personal experiences, two things may spring to mind when you hear the term “cocktail party problem.” The first is you thinking, “there are never enough cocktails to satisfy everyone’s requirements,” but maybe I’m projecting again. Alternatively, you may be considering how difficult it is for an artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled voice-controlled assistant like Amazon’s Alexa to follow individual voices when a Read Article Design for Additive Manufacturing with Your ECAD/MCAD 3D Printing Software Your next set of advanced PCBs will roll off your 3D printer with these Design for Additive Manufacturing guidelines Altium Concord Pro™ as a standalone product and brand name has been discontinued and the capabilities are now available as part of our Altium enterprise solutions. Learn more here . Industry 4.0 is surely on the horizon, and with the rate at which technology advances, many advanced products will be 3D printed in part or in full Read Article PCB Leakage Current and Breakdown in High Voltage Design Ohm’s law: it’s a wonderful tool we have for analyzing all types of circuits. This simple relation applies to so many devices that it’s quite easy to explain many aspects of component behavior with this single equation. With high voltage PCBs, however, we have to use other tools in addition to Ohm’s law to understand some important aspects of circuit behavior. Bring in Paschen’s law and Kirchoff’s laws, and you have everything you need to Read Article Flexible Circuit Designs with Large or Heavy Components One of the primary benefits of using a flexible circuit versus a rigid PCB board or wire and cable is the savings in weight and space. Flexible materials are thin, extremely light weight, and allow you to package in 3D, bending and folding to make necessary connections, allowing you to shrink the overall package size or fit additional electronics in a similarly-sized unit. As an example, a very typical two-layer construction for a flexible Read Article 48V to 3.3V Regulators Design Project Recently, I have been working on a 300W LED panel project. I’ve already written an article about building a 65W LED driver , and another about simulating it on PDN analyzer . However, there are some features I still want to implement, one of which is wireless dimming capability on the panels. Wireless dimming is important because getting the perfect balance of light is difficult when you have to keep pulling a light down from the top of a tall Read Article Design Philosophy in Printed Electronics Manufacturing In printed electronics, I think about design philosophy from a new perspective. My question about design philosophy is related to printed electronics manufacturing: do I optimize my layout for electrical performance or manufacturability, which may then mean compromises for electrical characteristics? In printed electronics design I need to make trade-offs between trace resistance, voltage levels, power consumption, and layout area. With proper Read Article Signal Integrity Evangelist Eric Bogatin, our Expert Insider to DesignCon 2020 Signal integrity expert, Dr. Eric Bogatin, explains Rule #9, drops details on the upcoming DesignCon in Santa Clara, and teases his new book on transmission lines. Watch this OnTrack podcast now. Read Article There’s a Lot of Quantum About These Days It’s disconcerting to discover how much remains unknown at the quantum level (Image source: pixabay.com) I just heard that China has developed the world’s first mobile quantum satellite communications station. At first, I didn’t know what to think about this news, but this is largely because I don’t understand “quantum.” Much of modern physics is based on two incredibly sophisticated and successful theories: general relativity and quantum Read Article Types of Printed Circuit Boards Once you start designing Printed Circuit Boards, you’ll find that different applications require have specialized design requirements. In order to meet all your design requirements without sacrificing workflow productivity, you need PCB design software that is adaptable to any design requirements. Working with the best PCB design software with a unified design interface makes it easy to define and satisfy design requirements for your specific Read Article Use Altium Designer’s IPC® Compliant Footprint Wizard to Make Unified PCB Library Footprints Altium Designer’s IPC® Compliant Footprint Wizard facilitates accurate PCB footprint generation for each component in Altium Designer. The footprint generation feature in Altium Designer overcomes some of the biggest productivity bottlenecks in other CAD systems, such as OrCAD/Allegro and PADS. Instead of manually creating every footprint from scratch, use the footprint generation tool in Altium Designer and our suite of automated library Read Article PCB Creators Look No Further than Altium Designer When it comes to PCB design software, the best software packages aren’t sold piecemeal. You need an integrated software solution that includes the latest and greatest tools demanded by the PCB design industry. Whether you are new to PCB design or you’ve been in the business for decades, Altium Designer gives you the tools to produce top-quality PCBs for any application. ALTIUM DESIGNER An integrated PCB design software package that contains all Read Article Reusing Your Old PCB Designs in Altium Designer Reusing or modifying your old designs is common among engineers and designers as this helps save you a considerable amount of time. There are times where it makes sense to reuse some or all of an old board, and you might as well completely recreate a device at other times. With Altium Designer, you can implement a comprehensive data management strategy that makes it easy to reuse old designs. You can even go further and use design methodologies Read Article Pagination First page « First Previous page ‹‹ Page76 Current page77 Page78 Page79 Page80 Page81 Next page ›› Last page Last » Load More