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5G Antenna Tuning in Mobile and IoT Devices 5G Antenna Tuning in Mobile and IoT Devices 5G antenna tuning is like tuning a guitar as you play Guitar players know all about tuning their instruments. Whether swinging a whammy bar on stage or just ensuring each string hits the right note, this tuning changes that the resonant frequencies of each to the tone desired by the musician. To continue the recent series of articles on PCB design for 5G systems, one other aspect of designing RF design for 5G-capable wireless systems involves a Read Article
How to Buy PC Boards From a Board Shop How to Buy PC Boards From a Board Shop Want to know how to buy the best boards? In this OnTrack podcast episode Greg Papandrew shares his better board buying tips. Listen in or watch now to learn more. Read Article
Hardware and Software Co-Exist Due to Model-Based Software Development Hardware and Software Co-Exist Due to Model-Based Software Development As we discussed in the last post, more software is making its way into traditional mechanical products, and organizations need to find new and innovative ways to deliver quality products within strict time constraints. Software and electronics are taking over everyday items, from household products to cars. Many smart products need to process copious amounts of information in real-time. Generic computer processors aren’t cutting it anymore Read Article
Weekly Digest: Electronic Product Design Weekly Digest: Electronic Product Design Get inspired by this week’s podcast that takes us to Michigan Tech to see how students are getting hands-on to prepare for high-tech jobs of the future. This week we also have new industry expert articles covering everything from the history vs. the myth of ferrite beads, the level of tolerance acceptable in your products, design data management as the multi-faceted and never-ending exploration that it is. Explore these topics and more shaping Read Article
500 Assembled Boards and All of Them Unusable 500 Assembled Boards and All of Them Unusable Recently, I received 500 assembled boards and all of them were unusable. It’s always one of the most exciting yet nerve-wracking times. You’ve been working on a new design, you’ve exhaustively tested prototypes and then you go to volume production. While it’s the same design as the known-good-tested prototype, it’s not necessarily the same “assembly instance,” if you will, so things can happen. Are all of my BOM line items correct? Did I specify Read Article
Top Issues in PCB Data Management Systems and Processes Top Issues in PCB Data Management Systems and Processes PCB Data Management is a journey with no final destination. On this journey, significant issues can and often pop up. If you decide to ignore them, they can worsen and ultimately lead to completely ruining your PCB data management systems and processes. In this blog, we will look at several of these issues. I prefer to call them pitfalls because they can appear suddenly, and you can easily fall into them if you’re not careful. But, if you are Read Article
Warning Signs You Need PCB Data Management Warning Signs You Need PCB Data Management I get a gut-wrenching feeling when people are doing PCB Design and ignoring all the warning signs around them. It’s like in the movies. I enjoy watching horror movies, but too many times I find them more funny and predictable than scary. Why is it every time the “bad guy” starts to chase the unfortunate helpless victim, their automatic response is to run to the top floor of the building? Everyone is shocked when the person meets their “unseen” Read Article
Printed Circuit Fabrication Classes at Michigan Tech PCB Assembly and Fabrication Classes at Michigan Tech Curious about What Universities offer Printed Circuit Fabrication classes? Learn what one professor at MTU is doing to innovate in electrical engineering student education. Read Article
Designing Your PCB for a Boundary Scan Test Designing Your Circuit Board for Boundary Scan PCB Testing You can avoid some manual circuit tests with a boundary scan test On simple boards with few components and surface-level traces, you can probably test all aspects of your board by hand without much difficulty. Imagine you needed to do this with a multilayer PCB, and you’ll see that there are many aspects of a manufactured and assembled board that cannot be tested by hand. With more advanced boards, where traces are embedded in the interior layers Read Article
Meeting EMI/EMC Standards in Your PCB Designs PCB EMI/EMC Guidelines: Meeting EMI/EMC Standards in Your Designs What if you set two cell phones next to each other and suddenly neither of them worked properly? Thankfully, this doesn’t happen because designers and manufacturers made serious efforts to ensure these devices comply with EMC standards on conducted and radiated EMI. Any device should comply with EMC standards before it makes it to the marketplace. While this sounds complicated, you have a number of simple design strategies to help your next Read Article
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