2134 results found for Technology Report, displaying items 1 - 20
November 16, 2009 Take The Stress Out Of Measuring IEC 61000-4-2 Stress Levels In Portable Devices
Testing electrical systems for electrostatic discharge (ESD) robustness usually involves using IEC 61000-4-2 as a benchmark. This standard defines the stress current waveforms for each voltage level, how to calibrate the ESD pulse source, the test environment for the measurements, and the pass and fail criteria. It also provides guidance on how to perform the tests. But when performing ESD testing on electrical systems, it’s not clear how much stress...
—
Robert Ashton
November 16, 2009 What's New In ESD Protection Devices
Obviously, electrostatic discharge (ESD) is one of many critical considerations in almost every design project. Equally obvious is the fact that there is no shortage of solutions to keep ESD at bay. Maxim Integrated Products describes its MAX4895E as the industry’s smallest VGA-port protector (Fig. 1). In addition to ESD protection on all seven of its video outputs, the 3- by 3-mm, 16-pin thin quad...
—
Mat Dirjish
November 5, 2009 Li-ion Suppliers Try To Find The Right Chemistry With Car Buyers
Since Sony introduced them in 1991, lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries have transformed portable electronic products. Now, carmakers and would-be automotive battery suppliers are looking for a similar transformation to redefine automotive propulsion. Currently, well over 2 billion Li-ion battery cells are sold annually for consumer electronic applications, most notably cell phones and laptop computers. If cars become a significant market for Li-ion batteries, this...
—
Randy Frank
October 22, 2009 Playing The Board Game: Stack' em, Pack 'em, And Rack 'em
Stacking architectures such as PC/104 and computer-on-module (COM) rule when it comes to customizing compact, rugged systems. With standardization, boards from one vendor can plug into another, providing a host of options. As a result, developers can seize processing power from vendors with single-board computers (SBCs) and I/O boards from another vendor. The typical stacking system, such as PC/104, paves the way for simple expansion and offers ruggedization...
—
William Wong
October 8, 2009 All Hail OFDM
Virtually all major new wireless technologies, including WiMAX and LTE, are based on orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM), which has emerged as the wireless spectral efficiency leader. As long as you have the spectrum, you can get more bits per hertz than almost any other technology. It also has an inherent way to implement an access scheme for multiple users. On top of that, it’s a great fit with multiple-input, multiple-output (MIMO),...
—
Louis E. Frenzel
October 8, 2009 The 4G Wireless Showdown: LTE Versus WiMAX
The development of Long-Term Evolution (LTE) and WiMAX has become, well, long term. Both technologies use advanced methods like orthogonal frequency-division multiple access (OFDMA) and multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) (see “All Hail OFDM”). They’re also fully IP-based (Internet Protocol), offering high-speed data capability to deliver fast Internet access and advanced...
—
Louis E. Frenzel
September 24, 2009 You're Using How Many FPGAs?
Designing a single-purpose FPGA prototype board is hard enough. But what about a register-transfer-level (RTL) emulation system based on FPGAs? Emulators are known for their fast compile times and simulator-like debug capabilities—features not normally associated with FPGAs. Throw in the need to support up to 1 billion ASIC-equivalent gates as well as multiple concurrent users with multiple use models, and you’ve got quite a challenge. That, in fact, is the challenge EVE faced while...
—
Ron Choi
September 24, 2009 Tool Up For The FPGA Blitz
FPGA usage divides into two primary segments. Historically, the foremost role of FPGAs has been to verify an ASIC, system-on-achip (SoC), or application-specific standard part (ASSP). Designers now will use FPGAs to prototype a portion or all of their design, to tweak the same, or as a platform to get ahead on developing system software. According to some industry experts, as many as 90% to 100% of ASICs today are prototyped on FPGAs. For many years, a main...
—
David Maliniak
September 10, 2009 MMICs Meet Bandwidth Demands At Millimeter-Wave Frequencies
Microwave component and module manufacture has been well understood and automated for many years. Myriad applications benefit from the capabilities driven by high volumes of microwave point-to-point links. But at frequencies around 60 GHz, the manufacture of millimeter-wave systems turns from a highvolume automated operation into a hand-tuned black art. Success in building millimeter-wave modules and subsystems by integrating very high-frequency monolithic...
—
John McNicol
August 27, 2009 Connect The Dots Toward Efficient Serial-To-Ethernet Adapter Design
Back in the 1970s and 1980s, when the RS-232 serial protocol was being adapted to the address the demands of electronic terminals and personal computers, few could have imagined that it would become such a standard feature. Thousands of industrial devices were developed based on the RS-232 interface. But for electronic communications, the evolutionary process was already kicking into a higher gear. Today, Ethernet is a well-defined standard for local and...
—
Paolo Alcantara
, et al.
August 13, 2009 Cool Ceramics Help Simplify LED Heat Dissipation
Light-emitting diodes (LEDs) suffer from heat problems that understandably can limit their success as a light source. Much attention is given to the heatsink, and less is given to the layers and barriers between the LED and the heat-dissipating surface. A change of concept and material allows for significant gains in thermal management and reliability in addition to a simplified system. Using ceramics as a heatsink, circuit carrier, and part of...
—
Armin Veitl
July 23, 2009 46th DAC Is This July’s San Francisco Treat
Attendees of past Design Automation Conferences (DACs) could count on hearing from EDA vendors and design technologists. This year’s 46th DAC takes a significant step by adding the voices of the tool users themselves. With more than 80 papers focused on the latest in tool use and methodologies, the User Track joins DAC’s technical program when the conference kicks off July 26-31 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. The 46th DAC’s technical program comprises...
—
David Maliniak
July 9, 2009 Motion-Sensing MEMS Gyros And Accelerometers Are Everywhere
In a conference room at Analog Devices (ADI), Howard Wisniowski holds a demo board a little bigger than a commemorative stamp about a meter above the table top. An ADI motion sensor and associated circuitry are on the board. Wisniowski drops the board into his other hand. As soon as the board starts to fall free, the motion sensor detects a change in acceleration. Before the board reaches Wisniowski’s lower hand, an LED flashes red and a tiny transducer on the...
—
Don Tuite
June 25, 2009 Match Multicore With Multiprogramming
Across the embedded landscape, the design credo has become “more cores.” However, challenges remain when it comes to the software side. Some hardware architectures can deliver dozens of cores, while others hit thousands of cores. Unfortunately, applications don’t always port easily across different architectures. For the low end of the embedded space, single-core solutions will remain. It’s still possible to move up the power and performance curve by moving to...
—
William Wong
June 18, 2009 Hot Cellular Market Can't Escape Icy Economic Winds
While nothing seems to be totally immune to the economic downturn, except perhaps government growth, the wireless industry is still performing better than most. Revenue is down, but the subscriber rate is up. U.S. carriers added 15 million new subscribers in 2008, boosting the total to more than 270 million by the end of the year. Just over 2.2 trillion minutes were used for voice calls alone in 2008. Total cellular revenue topped $148...
—
Louis E. Frenzel
June 18, 2009 Beyond The "Great Recession"
If one looks at the last 50 years of engineering boom-and-bust cycles and correlates them with the “stealth” technologies that emerged during those periods, one can see an encouraging pattern: breakthrough technologies take root during the crises and eventually transform the industry. Often, few people initially grasp these technologies or their potential. It’s also regrettably demonstrable that the actual pioneers have rarely been the ones to reap the big...
—
Don Tuite
June 18, 2009 Motor Control: More Than Just Switching MOSFETs
Enter “motion control” or “motor control” into your favorite search engine, and you’ll be rewarded with links to an ad-hoc encyclopedia of solid design information. Freescale’s site (www.freescale.com/webapp/sps/site/overview.jsp?nodeId=02M0zpbnQXGM0zpqCKS2&tid=tMCdr) is broad, deep, and far more than a product selection guide—which it...
—
Don Tuite
June 18, 2009 Laptops, Netbooks, And E-books, Oh My!
You don’t need to wave a magic wand to capitalize on the hordes of mobile devices that are on the market these days. They’ve become bright spots in a wobbly consumer electronics industry as buyers look for new bargains. In many instances, the cutting edge, such as the iPhone and Kindle, still carries a premium price. But the potential of lower-cost alternatives as well as the functionality provided by these new platforms is driving interest. ...
—
William Wong
June 18, 2009 Putting Robots In Harm's Way
Aremote-controlled landing craft approaches a beach and deploys its robotic cohorts, including a helicopter. The helicopter flies inland and deposits a set of tracked robots that split up to reconnoiter. They use laser designators to highlight targets for incoming robot fighter planes that will launch missiles as part of a coordinated attack. This futuristic scenario is years away, not decades. Odds are good that if you step on a battlefield, a...
—
William Wong
June 18, 2009 White Goods See Significant Motor-Control Innovations
Cars are exciting, and appliances are boring, right? That depends. While you can’t take an air conditioner for test drives on a frozen lake to evaluate its dynamic response to regenerative braking in slippery conditions, as Greg Solberg did with the Tesla Roadster, there can still be challenges. For example, cultural and economic differences in regional markets for white goods influence motor-control design. On the cultural side, to cite one case, China and Japan present a...
—
Don Tuite
prev. page
[1]
