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PCB Design

PCB gold traces on polyimide flex materials

PCBs with Gold Traces and Conductors, Now on Flex Materials Flexible polyimide is bio-compatible and critical to many medical applications. Gold PCB traces on flex PCBs provides a fully biocompatible option. Here's how the fabrication process works. Read Article

Single-Board Computer Review and Roundup

Best Single-Board Computers Review and Roundup Single-board computers offer an interesting way to get started with a project that needs more computing power than a microcontroller. Take a look at our latest single-board computer review. Read Article

Being Right Matters! When, Why and What to Simulate

Being Right Matters! When, Why and What to Simulate Steve Sandler, electronics simulation and PI guru, prolific author, AEi Systems founder, and president of Picotest, joins the OnTrack Podcast for a “hold onto your seats” discussion of how he came to simulate the International Space Station for NASA, the intricacies of the James Webb Space Telescope, his flash of insight while improving WEBENCH®, modern board level issues, and his secret life as a pizza chef. Read Article

S-parameter causality

How to Verify Signal Integrity Causality in S-parameters We often hear about how time-domain simulations require causal S-parameters. We’ll explore what S-parameter causality means and what non-causal S-parameters do to channel analysis. Read Article

Single Cell Lithium Polymer Battery Charger Project

Single Cell Lithium Polymer Battery Charger Project Learn how to create your first Altium project. This simple example shows you how to build a low-cost USB powered single cell lithium polymer battery charger. Read Article

How Material Characteristics Factor into High Speed PCB Signal Performance

How Material Characteristics Factor into High Speed PCB Signal Performance Evaluating laminates for a particular PCB implementation can be a complex, multilevel process, especially when it comes to the operation of key components on the board, such as high-speed differential pairs. This article will examine some of the factors that come into play with the evaluation process: materials with a low dielectric content versus materials that are low loss; comparing the advantages and disadvantages of each of them; taking into Read Article

Vias in PCIe routing

What Happens to PCIe Signals Traversing Blind Vias at Higher Speeds? In our one, two and three-day courses, which we conduct at technical and trade conferences as well as at private on-site classes, we will frequently be asked about particular technology trends and their impact on current designs. Of late, a number of these questions have focused on how the use of PCI Express (also known as PCIe) at higher frequencies impacts signals that change layers through vias. Limits on the number of vias in PCIe generations Read Article

Selecting and Tracking a General-Purpose Op-Amp

Selecting and Tracking a General-Purpose Op-Amp Learn the most critical parameters that should be considered when you're selecting a general-purpose Op-Amp. Read Article

Take Control of the Electronics Life Cycle with Cloud Collaboration

Take Control of the Electronics Life Cycle with Cloud Collaboration The electronics life cycle is a funny thing in that it relies so heavily on component lifecycles. Despite this relationship, every electronic product lifecycle follows a similar track as any other product. New products start with early adoption, later rise with sustained growth to peak adoption, and fade as new products become available with better features. Once you accept this fact, you can determine how to plan out your design and business Read Article

RGB + White LED Strip Controller

RGB + White LED Strip Controller for Designers I’ve been playing around with RGB LED strips recently for lighting up my test equipment rack as well as some display shelves. On the display shelves, I have the RGB LED strips behind the shelves, which gives a great definition to the objects on the shelf. But I also want to have a high CRI white LED strip on each shelf to light up the objects. Typical RGBW LED strips available through online marketplaces do not have very good white LEDs, and I’m Read Article

Designing a multi-layer stackup in Altium Designer 21

Designing a Four-layer PCB Stackup With No Plane Capacitance At first glance, it might seem that designing a 4-layer PCB should be an easy task, but just like any other board, it requires the right kind of layout and stack-up. Kella Knack gives as an expert advise on how to successfully design Multi-layer stack PCBs. Read Article

Silk to Solder Mask Clearance: The PCB Design Rule You Need to Add

Silk to Solder Mask Clearance: The PCB Design Rule You Need to Add I was impressed that, right out of the box, the stock design rule checks (DRCs) in my copy of Altium 20 pretty much covered all the bases on how to make a “standard” printed circuit board (PCB). Altium Designer defaults to “10 mil” rules, which means that the standard spacing and widths of copper tracks is 10 mils. What's more, most of the other spacings also default to 10 mils. This includes track to track, pads to tracks, through-holes to other Read Article

Know the Power Dissipation

How to Calculate Power Dissipation Understanding the power dissipation of an individual component, an electrical block, or even the whole electronics system is essential for electronics engineers. It is important not only to avoid exceeding the maximum limits of components but also to calculate unknown parameters in input or output sides because power dissipation is related to system voltage and current. In this article, I describe my practices for analyzing power dissipation in Read Article

US Department of Transportation Seeking Alternatives to GPS

US Department of Transportation Seeking Alternatives to Advanced Navigation GPS GPS-capable devices range from your phone to your smartwatch; simply type in your destination and follow the directions. Simple, right? According to the Washington Post, we should all stop using GPS as it’s ruining the navigation centers of our brains. Despite the neurological effects on perception and judgment, the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) aims to find alternatives to GPS to provide redundancy. What started as a defense initiative Read Article

Low EMI, Low Noise Voltage Regulator

Low Noise, Low EMI Voltage Regulator A couple of months ago, I purchased an entry-level cinematography camera: the Black Magic Ursa Mini Pro 4.6K G2. I'm planning to use it for project videos, factory tours, and trade show interviews with it mostly being mounted on a shoulder rig. In addition to the camera itself, this requires a surprising number of devices to be powered. To save having lots of batteries to keep track of, I want to run everything off the main camera battery Read Article

Finding a PCB Electronic Search Engine for Your Component Needs

Finding a PCB Electronic Search Engine for Your Component Needs Maintaining proper components within your circuit board necessities becomes much easier when you have a real-time updating electronics search engine. ALTIUM DESIGNER PCB design software built for your electronic component search needs. When the time inevitably comes in every design journey, part data management will become a critical system that will require the utmost of ease and editability. Getting caught up in the manual editing web of part Read Article

Best PCB Design Software for Your Single Sided PCB

Best Single Layer PCB Design Software for Your Single-Sided PCB A one-sided PCB design needs the same attention to detail in its design as a large multi-layer board, it needs Altium Designer. ALTIUM DESIGNER The most powerful, modern, and easy-to-use PCB design tool for professional use. It may seem like the world of PCB design revolves around complex multi-layer high-performance PCBs or other exotic design technologies, but the need for single-sided PCB designs is as great as it ever has been. Their Read Article