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Altium Designer - PCB Design Software

Easy, Powerful, Modern: Altium Designer is the world’s most trusted PCB design system for professionals and students. Browse our resources to learn more about how Altium Designer is revolutionizing the PCB design industry, and empowering designers to bring all of their ideas to life!

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Altium 365 Easy Collaboration

Best Practices in Hardware Version Control Systems Read more about some best practices for using hardware version control systems in electronics design. Read Article

Altium Designer Quick Install Guide Since you now have access to the latest version of Altium Designer, let's take a few minutes to get it Watch Video

SAP (Semi-additive PCB process): The Basics

SAP (Semi-additive PCB process): The Basics Expert Tara Dunn answers what are semi-additive PCB fabrication processes and what are the benefits? Read now and learn more about SAP. Read Article

PCB Designers for SpaceX and Beyond: Yesterday’s Fiction, Tomorrow’s Reality

PCB Designers for SpaceX and Beyond: Yesterday’s Fiction, Tomorrow’s Reality I’ve wanted a career in engineering for as long as I can remember. There were people who could MacGyver something out of nothing and I wanted to be one of those people. I’m sure that watching science fiction on TV added a lot to that. I mean, who wouldn’t want to manipulate technology and control immense power like “Scotty” on Star Trek? I found out that I’m not alone in those dreams—apparently, Scotty was the inspiration for much interest in Read Article

microstrip to ground clearance

Microstrip Ground Clearance Part 2: How Clearance Affects Losses In a previous article, I provided a discussion and some simulation results on the necessary clearance between impedance controlled traces and nearby grounded copper pour. What we found was that, once the spacing between the pour and the trace becomes too small, the trace becomes an impedance-controlled coplanar waveguide (with or without ground). We also saw that the 3W rule for the spacing between the trace and the grounded copper pour is a bit Read Article

Differential Pairs and Differential Signals

What Are Differential Pair Signals? Differential pairs and differential signaling are the mainstay of high speed digital communication and data transfer. Read Article

what is signal integrity

What is Signal Integrity? Learn about the basics of signal integrity and how you can ensure your PCB layout complies with best practices for signal integrity. Read Article

Phalanx, not Failure: PCB Shielding to Protect Your Design

Phalanx, not Failure: PCB Shielding to Protect Your Design During 7 B.C., Greek soldiers—or hoplites--carried a large, concave, circular pcb shield called the hoplon. Made from bronze and wood, the hoplon or Argive shield protected hoplites from chin to knee and—when overlapped—became the basis for the Greek phalanx. At the beginning of the 20th century, Ethiopians used their shields when fighting against an invading Italian army. The constant banging on the shields by the Ethiopians mingled with war Read Article

ISM Bands Around the World

ISM Bands Around the World ISM bands (industrial, scientific, and medical) are parts of the RF (radio-frequency) spectrum reserved for general use by, as the name suggests, scientific, medical, and industrial devices. Their creation was in response to specific demands by these industries for access to the RF spectrum to perform functions without having to compete with the traditionally intensive users of RF, the communications, and defense sectors. The critical thing to Read Article

Choosing the Right Microphone for Embedded Applications

Choosing the Right Microphone for Embedded Applications If you need to capture sound waves for your electrical device to process, you'll need a microphone. However, microphones these days have become very advanced, and there are so many options to choose from. While they are relatively small, they come with a broad range of options and technologies. They range from the relatively simple and popular condenser type microphones to state-of-the-art sound conversion solutions incorporating internal Read Article

Composite Amplifiers and How They Give the Best of Both Worlds

Composite Amplifiers and How They Give the Best of Both Worlds There are many times where you need an amplifier with high gain, low noise, high slew rate, and broad bandwidth simultaneously. However, not all of these design goals are possible with all off-the-shelf components. One solution is creative use of multiple amplifiers in a composite amplifier design. With the right composite amplifier, you can create a unique amplifier that exploits the best characteristics of each amplifier stage. Here are some Read Article

Avoid Re-Placing the Same Parts Over and Over Again with a Pre-Placement Checklist

Avoid Re-Placing the Same Parts Over and Over Again with a Pre-Placement Checklist Sometime during the evolution of the automobile, car makers decided that reading and understanding engine gauges were too difficult tasks for the average driver. To remedy this they substituted the check engine light instead; unlike the malfunction indicators of today which are computer controlled warnings, those early check engine lights would only tell you of a problem once it was occurring. Reporting a problem after it occurs is not the Read Article

5 Noteworthy Women in PCB Design

5 Noteworthy Women in PCB Design Women in technology is a hot topic, especially how to get more women involved in technology-related fields. What I find most interesting about this subject is what motivates people to pursue a career in technology in the first place. In general, there are a lot of men in this field and, as a woman in tech myself, I think attracting new people to the industry is always positive. I encourage people to pursue careers in technology, no matter their Read Article

PCB routing

What is PCB Routing? Learn about PCB routing techniques and how to design traces to proper routing in any device. You can access the best PCB routing features in Altium Designer. Read Article

multiphase buck converter RF power supply

Designing a Multiphase Buck Converter for an RF Power Supply Consider a multiphase buck converter for the regulator stage in your RF power supply. Alongside envelope tracking, you can ensure high efficiency power delivery and transmission. Read Article

Gibbs ringing

What Causes Gibbs Signal Ringing in High-speed Channel Simulations? Gibbs ringing is both a measurement artifact and a calculation artifact that arises in band-limited channels. Make sure you understand how this arises due to transform and convolution operations. Read Article

PCB connectors shock-resistant

Altium Designer Makes Connector Creation and Placement Easy See how you can select, find, and place shock-resistant PCB connectors in your layout with Altium Designer. Read Article