35 Real Time Trace Corrections Watch Video PCB Creativity and Training: Utilizing Creative Routing Solutions with Tight Component Placement When I was working in a research lab and designing PCBs for our homemade optical systems, my layouts were down and dirty. We didn’t worry about little things like packaging, limited board space, or compact routing. We were happy as long as we could get all of the required components to appear on the board and eventually the board became a printed circuit. Once our microscope systems became more intricate, connecting our high speed, custom images Read Article 1:06 HDI Design Support with Altium's Stackup Manager . Watch Video 3:06 Diff between sheet n Doc templates Draftsman - How-To:ADSCvid Watch Video Design Survival Guide in a World of Parts Shortages Every EE and PCB is feeling the pinch of component shortages these days. How in the world have basic standard capacitors become scarce? When are we going to see the end of this annoying state of affairs? How can designers work around these shortages and get their work done--on time?! I gave John Watson of LeGrand a call to ask these questions and more. As a PCB design lead who oversees 50 designers globally, I knew he’d have a lot to share on Read Article Altium Resources for Learning PCB Design At Altium, we continually produce and publish resources to help you be the best you can be, as well as help enable you to take full advantage of the features found in Altium. Since there is so much available, we thought we’d share a few shortcuts to finding whatever resource it is you’re looking for. AltiumLive: Annual PCB Design Summit is our live event where we share lots of great teaching by industry leaders, Altium staff and Altium users Read Article Easily Placed Surface Mount Technology with 3D Viewing Software Years ago while designing a printed circuit board for one of my company’s products, I was called over to the mechanical design department for an impromptu meeting. They had pulled in my design files into their 3D mechanical CAD system and wanted to show me something. There it was as big as life; one of my tall electrolytic capacitors was sticking up right through the plastic enclosure. While trying to restrain their laughter, they sarcastically Read Article What Every Scope User Needs to Know About Transmission Lines - Eric Bogatin Read Article How a Components Search Engine Helps You Choose Parts For Your PCB If you owned a computer during the 1990’s, then you remember when internet search engines became massively popular. Most homepages were likely set to one of the three or four major search engines. This made surfing the digital highway so much easier, and now search functionality is integrated in many different websites and applications. Anytime you need to quickly locate specific entries in a large database, using a search engine is the fastest Read Article Browsing Electronic Component Distributor Inventory with Integrated Libraries Even though I make a lot of lists just to keep track of all the different activities going on with my business, it gets tiring. When I need to buy office supplies, it helps to have all my options in one place so that I can figure out where I need to go to buy everything. Thankfully, when you’re sourcing for your PCB, there are solutions that show you all your distributor options. Browsing through distributor websites to source components for your Read Article Build Your Next Engineering BOM With Integrated Design Software It’s easy to collaborate on a project with a small number of people. I’ve always found that two or three people can thoroughly hash out the details on a project in person and produce great results. But as a team grows in size, you’ll spend more time reading and writing documentation. This is not necessarily a bad thing; it helps formalize processes and products across an organization and ensures that everyone can stay on the same page. Any new Read Article Integration of Schematic Capture, Layout, and Databases Improves Efficiency Do you like seeing old classic cars in movies and on TV? So do I. Would slipping behind the wheel of a vintage Model T Ford for a test drive be the highlight of your bucket list? Mine too. Would it be as simple and easy as they show on TV? Absolutely not. Of the three pedals on the floor of the Model T, the left controls first gear, neutral, and second gear depending on if you push it in all the way, half way or not at all. The middle pedal is Read Article When to Prefer Longer PCB Traces Over Additional Vias Whenever I go to buy a new big-ticket appliance, I always weigh my options. Sometimes I let this paralyze me, and I end up making a spending decision that I later regret. But it doesn’t have to be this way when deciding how to route signals in your next PCB. When you have many components and interconnects to place on your PCB, you need to weigh your options. Dense routing is as much an art as it is science, and having as much information as Read Article Electronic Parts Sourcing with Integrated Component Libraries The weekend is grocery time at our house, and we always make a thorough list of everything we need for the next two weeks and where we will be buying it. You may not be as meticulous as my wife and I when it comes to buying groceries, but it pays to be thorough when you need to build a bill of materials for your PCB. Once you’ve got your design complete, you need to ask yourself: where am I going to get all of these components I just placed in my Read Article Identify Vendor Parts Early: Manage BoMs Proactively With Consolidated Part Sourcing Walking a tightrope requires intricate balance. Simply visualized as a walker and a rope in space. Simple moves into complexity when the walker’s senses are skewed to balance. Careful placement of each foot pulls from neurological pathways communicating intricate information simultaneously. Should information fail to arrive when the foot is moving may push the walker off the rope. Managing Bills of Material from early circuit concept through Read Article What to do With Unused Pins on a Microcontroller I must admit that I’m not exactly the right person to turn to for cleaning tips. I dread the annual spring cleaning as there are always surprises in the storerooms to deal with. Occasionally, I stumble upon items that I barely even recognize but eventually decide to hold on to. While my indecisiveness with unused items results in some nagging from my wife and loss of additional space, failing to deal with unused pins on a microcontroller can have Read Article A Complete Bill of Materials and Other Suggestions for Error Free PCB Manufacturing Long before my youngest son became a teenager, we already knew that in everything that he did he worked at turning the situation around to best benefit himself. At one point he was doing something that he shouldn’t be doing, and I told him that if he continued down that path that I would ground him. Instead of backing off as I expected, he instead had a contemplative look on his face as he asked me; “for how long would I be grounded?” I couldn’t Read Article Pagination First page « First Previous page ‹‹ Page119 Current page120 Page121 Page122 Page123 Page124 Next page ›› Last page Last » Load More