209 results found for Engineering Essentials, displaying items 1 - 20
November 16, 2009 Stars Of The Really Small Screen
Electronic addictions abound, due mainly to the surging popularity of gadgets like MP3 players and video games. In the face of this electronics mania, television remains a leading pastime. Even average viewers spend several hours a day watching the tube. But the type of viewing is changing. Instead of sitting in front of the latest LCD or plasma screen, viewers are on the go with their portable devices. New standards have been established, services are...
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Louis E. Frenzel
November 5, 2009 Motor-Control Resources
A good general view of field-oriented control (FOC) can be found in Texas Instruments’ 1998 white paper, “Field Orientated Control of 3-Phase AC Motors”, which can be downloaded for free. For a more recent treatment, though its references go back at least as far as 1980, readers can check out “A Seamless Whole Speed Range Control of Interior PM Synchronous Machine without Position Transducer” by Filka, Balazovic, and...
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Don Tuite
, et al.
November 5, 2009 A Multi-Level Approach Makes Understanding Motor Control Easier
Regardless of their primary field, sooner or later, most designers have to deal with motor controls. Broadly speaking, there are two methods to incorporating these components in your design. First, designers can start with one of the many choices of microcontrollers that are available and then address the challenges of making the control do what they want. Or second, designers can start at the other end and examine the interaction between motors and...
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Don Tuite
, et al.
October 22, 2009 Pick The Right Probe And Get The Most Out Of It
The first rule of thumb to be observed in choosing a test probe involves the probe’s bandwidth. “The bandwidth of the probe needs to be three to five times the signal bandwidth,” explains Jae-Yong Chang, Agilent Technologies’ product manager for probes. “Customers often are confused by signal bandwidth, which is driven by the fastest rise time of your circuitry.” When it comes to using high-end active test probes, it’s important to remember that these devices are...
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David Maliniak
October 22, 2009 High-End Probes Actively Improve Test Results
A steady stream of advances has elevated test and measurement instruments to the point where they can reveal minute details of signals with lightning-quick rise and fall times. So, then, what about test probes? The last thing test engineers want or need is a probe that’s going to influence their measurements or fail to deliver the full bandwidth that’s available to them on the scope. Fortunately, today’s high-end probes are constructed to sidestep these...
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David Maliniak
October 8, 2009 Wireless In The Works
If you blink, you’ll probably miss the latest announcement of a wireless standard under development. Short-range wireless standards in the works include the latest version of Wi-Fi, an ISA standard called ISA 100a, and a smart-grid version of 802.11.4. The 802.11 working group, known as Very High Throughput (VHT), is looking at ways to extend the data rate to 1 Gbit/s and beyond using the popular Wi-Fi standard and protocol. It’s examining the 60-GHz band as an option, plus...
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Louis E. Frenzel
October 8, 2009 Don't Be Intimidated By Low-Power RF System Design
Adding wireless connectivity to any product has never been easy. However, even when a wireless solution doesn’t seem to make sense, the potential exists. The cost is reasonable, and you add unexpected value and flexibility to the product. But what if you aren’t a wireless engineer? Don’t worry, because in many cases, the wireless chip and module companies have made such connectivity a snap. SELECTING A TECHNOLOGY The...
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Louis E. Frenzel
October 1, 2009 Prototype Your Way To Success
An infinite number of inventions is waiting to happen. It’s often hard to figure out why one idea succeeds and another falls by the wayside. Many factors can impact success, ranging from the quality of the product, to the way it’s marketed, to the timing of its release. Sometimes, it’s just pure luck. Often, great ideas fail because the inventor spends too much time trying to develop the perfect 1.0 version instead of simply producing...
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Mike Santori
October 1, 2009 Stubble Trouble—Beating Back Those Tin Whiskers
What is a tenth of the diameter of a human hair and only 1.5 mm long, but can shut down nuclear plants, misguide Patriot missiles, and cause the recall of thousands of quartz watches? The answer is tin whiskers, those tiny singlecrystal filaments that grow from the surface of tin and subsequently occur in electronic circuitry—often with devastating effect. Tin whiskers cause short circuits in the position they grow in or as ...
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Paul Whytock
October 1, 2009 Boost Instrumentation Accuracy With Direct Digital Synthesis
Direct digital synthesis (DDS) generates arbitrary frequency sinewaves with amazing accuracy and spectral purity. The ability to generate spectrally pure sinewaves at programmable arbitrary frequencies has application in instrumentation and communications products, among other uses. Today’s DDS components provide extremely accurate, spectrally pure sinewave generation with reasonable power requirements. Modern DDS components have...
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Paul Nickelsberg
October 1, 2009 Save Power By Managing Unused CMOS I/O Pins
It’s easy to overlook unused digital inputs when designing with a CMOS device, but doing so invites problems. When unused digital inputs are left unconnected they will float, which can cause both unexpected logic behavior and excessive current draw. Several simple approaches for managing these unused inputs can save significant debugging grief. Essentially, a CMOS digital input circuit uses MOSFET transistors in pairs (...
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Jonathan Dillon
October 1, 2009 Verify Control Systems Before Committing To Hardware
Embedded-control system designers feel more pressure than ever to provide better performance and more features, all while meeting tight deadlines and keeping costs down. As these demands intensify, traditional design and verification methodologies tend to fall short. In traditional design flows, designers can’t determine if their controller works until late in the effort, when hardware is available. This was often sufficient for ...
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Brian McKay
October 1, 2009 Phase-Change Technology Enters The Memory Market
Phase-change memory (PCM) is a new class of nonvolatile memory technology. Like most new technologies, it offers benefits to those who know where and when to apply it. To understand where PCM fits today and to appreciate its potential value, we need to evaluate its relative cost, reliability, and performance compared to incumbent technologies such as single-level cell (SLC) and multilevel cell (MLC) NAND flash, as well as system solutions...
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Ed Doller
October 1, 2009 Regenerative Current Transformation Delivers Sub-Volt Regulated Output
Regenerative topologies and systems have been explored extensively in regards to providing regenerative loads for burn-in systems,1 enabling efficient burn-in of power supplies. Regenerative burnin systems are desirable, as the power supply ideally functions as both source and load. This means a substantial energy savings (up to 90%) when attempting to provide a burn-in function. For example, in a non-regenerative burn-in...
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Paul Yeaman
September 24, 2009 The ABCs Of ADCs
Real-world applications require real-world connections. Generally, that means an analog signal is being digitized somewhere in the system so a microprocessor, ASIC, or FPGA can gather data and make some decision. If you’re new to data converter concepts or if it’s been a long time since your last analog class, the datasheet and design specifications and considerations can seem alien or even outright confusing. So what do all of those acronyms mean, and why should you...
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Martin Mason
September 10, 2009 Multi-Antenna Techniques Require Thorough Testing Solutions
Multiple input/multiple output (MIMO) is the use of multiple antennas at both the transmitter and receiver to improve communication performance. Performance is the operative word here, in terms of capacity, bandwidth, throughput, range, or a host of other parameters that enhance the user experience. Advanced wireless communications standards such as Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11), WiMAX (IEEE 802.16), and LTE (Long- Term Evolution from 3GPP) use multiple ...
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Graham Celine
August 27, 2009 The "Keys" To Securing A System
The standalone system has turned into an endangered species, making security an even more pressing issue among developers. This includes cell phones, Wi- Fi-enabled digital picture frames, and just about everything else. And when it comes to security, it helps to start with the basics. For starters, information can be exchanged as cleartext, authenticated, or encrypted (Fig. 1). Cleartext...
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William Wong
August 13, 2009 DMA Engines Bring Multicast To PCI Express Systems
Multicast, a technique commonly used in networking systems, allows a given processing unit to send a single data stream to multiple destinations at the same time efficiently. Typically, the switch employed as the interconnect backbone implements the actual multicast replication function. Because it’s programmable, it can duplicate a given packet to any given device connected to the switch. For example, a server can send a video stream to multiple...
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Miguel Rodriguez
August 13, 2009 A Technology Solution To Spectrum Limitations
Though the 700-MHz spectrum and white space have opened up new opportunities, spectrum will always be scarce and even more so in the future. Furthermore, it’s important to use every bit of existing technology for efficiency’s sake. In this regard, softwaredefined radio (SDR) techniques and cognitive radio are already being deployed. One technique you may not have considered, however, is deep packet inspection (DPI) (see “...
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Louis E. Frenzel
August 13, 2009 Big Changes In The Frequency Spectrum Cultivate New Wireless Possibilities
Mark Twain once said, “Buy land. They’re not making it anymore.” Such is the case with electromagnetic frequency spectrum. They’re scarce, coveted, and very expensive. Furthermore, they’re subject to regulation both nationally and internationally. The general consensus is that most of the good spectrum are already allocated. But the opposing view is that lots of existing unused or underutilized spectrum could be used (see “...
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Louis E. Frenzel
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