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The most powerful, modern and easy-to-use PCB design tool for professional use

Altium Designer 20

The most powerful, modern and easy-to-use PCB design tool for professional use

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PCB Design for Radio-Over-Fiber Technology It’s possible that radio-over-fiber technology is one of the least discussed aspects of fiber telecom networks. However, it stands to be one of the many portions of telecom infrastructure for bringing broadband wireless access to remote areas. This approach is likely to play a major role for future 5G infrastructure in rural areas where a standard wireless backhaul is not possible or cost-prohibitive. Just like any other electronic system, radio Read Article

Exploring Arduino is Now Expanded and Updated by Jeremy Blum The Altium OnTrack Podcast with Judy Warner welcomes one of the Hardware design community’s brightest stars, Jeremy Blum. Jeremy recently released a new version of his book that is a heavily expanded and updated edition. Exploring Arduino, has helped people around the world and now you can get a completely up-to-date version, which you can buy now. Jeremy is a two-time AltiumLive keynote speaker and has also been featured on this podcast twice Read Article

Get Inspired by Major League Hacking with Jonathan Gottfried Jonathan Gottfried is co-founder of Major League Hacking, or MLH, the official student hackathon league. Major League Hacking’s vision is to inspire students worldwide from both traditional and non-traditional backgrounds. They’ve influenced new generations of engineers; from software, hardware, and mechanical disciplines in the events they have thrown worldwide. Learn more about Jonathan and his inspiring work at MLH. Listen to the Podcast Read Article

Creating a Ground Plane for Your PCB Design It used to be that printed circuit boards seemed to have the same basic layer configuration, or at least that’s the way I tend to remember it. This meant that they were usually six layer multi-layer boards, with a ground plane and a VCC plane. The old CAD systems didn’t really have the ability to do much with power planes except to designate layers as a negative plane. The most you would see in them would be some “X’s” where there was supposed to Read Article

The Advantages and Disadvantages of Active and Passive RFID Technologies When I’m designing a new PCB or product one of the hardest parts for me is choosing exactly which components I should use. It seems like every technology out there now has a different configuration to achieve the best performance. Even when you’re dealing with a fairly straightforward technology like radio frequency identification (RFID) circuit board there are a lot of flavors to choose from. While every type of RFID design label uses an active Read Article

Circuit Design Tips: PCB Moisture Protection for Humid Environments I pride myself on being meticulous when I check my designs. I can spend hours checking schematics, footprints and the proper values of components before finalizing the design. Unfortunately, the same zeal and perfectionism cannot be said with my housekeeping skills. A cleaner would have been horrified by the accumulated dust in the corners of my house. It was particularly embarrassing when I forgot to wash my dish tray and it became the home to a Read Article

How to Use a Ferrite Bead in Your Design to Reduce EMI EMI can be a tricky subject. That’s why I’ve been writing about things like proper grounding, AC/DC circuits, high speed routing, and differential pair routing. Next on the list is how to reduce EMI using ferrite beads. Ferrite cores can be a bit tricky, which is why it’s important to first understand the theory behind them. Most electronic components are essentially plug and play; however, ferrites have to be designed into your system. Once you Read Article

Using ESD Grounding Techniques to Protect Your PCB from Electrical Damage I was in high school before I considered engineering as a career outside of the engine room on any Star Trek show. Although, subconsciously I was definitely interested in it. The signs were there early considering I could name all the chief engineers from Star Trek. The deal was sealed though when I was ridiculously excited to receive an ESD grounding wrist strap bracelet as a gift. Don’t have one in your jewelry box? Well, it’s composed of Read Article

EMI Case History — Noise Problems and Their Solutions — Part 2 In Part 1 of this article, I described an EMI problem occurring in a LCD touch screen display of an autonomous robot cleaning machine. In order to provide consulting services we needed to solve a problem which originated because of the ground and supply bounce in the leads of the IC devices that were incorporated into that display. In Part 1, I also described the type of equipment in which the operation problem arose, the origin of the problem Read Article

Stealth Aircraft, Meet Quantum Radar If you read Max Clivefield's recent article on quantum computing and quantum communication, then you've got a head start on most when it comes to understanding entanglement. These esoteric areas of technology are likely to become more common in the coming decades, and could revolutionize modern technology. I don't think we'll ever have desktop quantum computers or quantum cell phones, but development of these new technologies has the potential to Read Article

Towards a Deeper Understanding with the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute Discover how Altium Designer + Altium 365 are helping power groundbreaking research on climate change and fostering a deeper understanding of our ecosystem with the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute. Read Article

Innovators Around the Globe Contribute to Coronavirus Intervention Colin Keogh PhD, CEO & Founder at The Rapid Foundation, has been on the front lines of the effort to combat ventilator shortages ever since a Facebook group called Open Source COVID-19 Medical Supplies (OSCMS) first presented the problem. As cofounder of Open Source Ventilator (OSV) Ireland and a member of its core team, Colin offers his uniquely qualified perspective on open source innovation: its obstacles, its advantages, and its impact on Read Article

Bluetooth 5.1 SoC vs. Module: Which is Best for Your Design? The list of features available in Bluetooth just got a little longer since the release of Bluetooth 5.1. Component manufacturers have taken this mobile technology to the next level for IoT devices by integrating wireless comms with an MCU for embedded processing. This is just another step in the continuous push to pack more functionality into a smaller footprint. If you want to incorporate a Bluetooth 5.1 SoC into your new product, you have two Read Article

Designing Pressure Tolerant Electronics: It's All About Mechanics After a recent inquiry from a customer about a high power board that must withstand high gas pressures, my team suddenly realized we needed to do some research on designing pressure tolerant electronics. This area is not as popular as designing electronics for ambient pressures, but the design techniques used here enable important scientific expeditions and industrial applications in high pressure environments. Whether the board will be placed in Read Article

Driving Haptic Vibration and Feedback in Wearables Augmented reality, virtual surgery, limb replacements, medical devices, and other new technologies need to incorporate haptic vibration motors and feedback to give the wearer a full sense of how they are interacting with their environment. Unless these cutting-edge applications include haptic vibration and feedback, users are forced to rely on their other four senses to understand the real or virtual environment. Low cost components to support Read Article

ADC Sampling Rate and Layout for Mixed Signal Boards Whenever you’re selecting an ADC, whether it is built into an MCU or as an external component, the sampling rate is a prime consideration, as it will determine how well you can reproduce a measured signal. RF applications, analog sensor boards, and other mixed-signal devices will need at least one ADC with an appropriately chosen ADC sampling rate. If you’re designing with a mixed-signal board, you’ll need to balance the required signal bandwidth Read Article

Are We Poised on the Brink of a New Age? A new material shaped like a one-dimensional DNA helix can be used to build transistors with diameters of only two nanometers. Read Article