January 10, 2000 Magazine Archive

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ISSUE DATE: JANUARY 10, 2000

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Technology Forecast Issue: Designing In The Communications Age

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January 10, 2000 - In This Issue

[Technology Report]
Of Holodecks And Transporters: The Promise Of Unlimited Bandwidth
For science-fiction aficionados, the holodeck rooms used by starship crew members in the various versions of Star Trek are the epitome of unbounded data bandwidth. The creation of computer-generated lifelike 3D images that can interact with their... — Dave Bursky

[Technology Report]
Communications Nirvana: Why Must We Strive To Reach That Plateau?
These are exciting times to be an engineer. I never thought I'd see the day when industrial, financial, and pharmaceutical interests would take a back seat to electronics on the evening news. This year, from microchips to software, the NASDAQ's... — Patrick Mannion

[Technology Report]
I'm Connected To The Universe, But I Forgot My Password
It's 5:30 a.m. and my alarm is ringing. As I get out of bed, my wristwatch/communicator notifies me that I have incoming messages from members of my global design team. Before getting dressed, I wander into the kitchen, grab a cup of coffee, and sit... — Cheryl Ajluni

[Technology Report]
My Embedded System Is On The Internet–What About Yours?
Virtually every embedded designer is looking to use digital communications to enhance or expand the reach of embedded systems. With new designs breaking ground and existing ones adding capabilities, the competition to develop the most compelling... — Peter Varhol

[Technology Report]
Display Technologies Get Ready For The Challenges Of The Wireless Age
Those who are curious about the future of display technology in communications may wish that they had access to that most ancient wireless display device: the crystal ball. This approach, however, has a number of drawbacks. While simple in... — David G. Morrison

[Technology Report]
Due To Technical Difficulties, We Cannot Bring You The World Today
Technical glitches. They're a part of life. Some are just an annoyance, while others are very costly—can you say Y2K? Worse yet, they promise to be much costlier in the future. No doubt you've noticed that the world economy is depending more... — Joseph Desposito

[Technology Report]
Dynamic Performance Is The Mantra For Analog And Mixed-Signal ICs
All anyone seems to be talking about lately is dynamic performance, dynamic performance, and... dynamic performance. It doesn't matter if it's a broadband amplifier or a high-performance, high-resolution data converter. Either way, every analog and... — Ashok Bindra

[Ideas For Design]
Off Line-UPS Offers Backup Power-Source Alternative
With increased dependency on electric power for various domestic, commercial purposes and the seemingly declining capacity of power utilities in many countries, the need for additional backup power sources is on the rise. Various modules are already... — Sharath R. Kumar

[Ideas For Design]
Use Accelerometers For Vibration Measurement And Control
Recent advances in microelectronic mechanical systems (MEMS) have made high-performance, high-accuracy, low-cost accelerometers available on a single monolithic IC. Accelerometers are used for acceleration and tilt measurements, vibration control,... — Abdul R.S. Bukhari

[Ideas For Design]
Alternating Relay Preserves Pumps By Equalizing Run Time
In many industrial pumping applications, two identical pumps are used for the same job. A standby unit is available in case the first pump fails. However, a completely idle pump might deteriorate and provide no safety margin. Alternating relays... — Henno Normet

[Ideas For Design]
Simulate A Neon Lamp In Spice By Using A Hysteric Resistor
Several types of circuit elements exhibit hysteretic behavior. Unfortunately, Spice simulation programs typically don't include an easy method to model such effects. For example, a simple neon light flasher is difficult to simulate with Spice... — David L. Albean

[Ideas For Design]
MOS Switches Find An Application In An Analog ATE Circuit
MOS switches have for the most part been excluded from a large number of analog and mixed-signal test applications because of their high leakage currents and larger on-resistances. Relays, particularly low-picofarad relays and low-thermal-EMF... — Tony Zizzo Jr.

[Ideas For Design]
Build Precise V/F Converter
This Idea for Design was originally published May 13, 1993, p. 70. A single-supply, 5-V powered, voltage-to-frequency (V/F) converter can be built with low-power ICs and just a handful of passive components (... — Walt Jung

[Editorial]
Now, For Some Really Big News
We waited until all of this millennium hoopla and Y2K stuff passed over so we could bring you some really exciting news. You told us you wanted more from Electronic Design. We listened, and now you're holding the results of your input—a... — Dave Bursky

[Pease Porridge]
What's All This Retrospective Stuff, Anyhow?
January (the month named after Janus, the door-keeper) is the traditional time for looking forward—and backward. The end of a century is a good time for looking back. I'll let all of the other pundits guess what they expect to happen for as... — Bob Pease

[Pease Porridge]
Schematic-Driven IC Layout Editor Accelerates SoC Design
The MAX-LS, a schematic-driven IC layout editor, includes interactive layout generators, a real-time design rule checker, and schematic and layout cross probing. Programmable and flexible, it also features technology that seamlessly works with all... — Richard Gawel

[Viewpoint]
The Post-PC Era Heralds Internet Appliances And Beyond
Electronic-design engineers now find themselves on the verge of a post-PC, Internet era. Connections between people aren't just being made through conventional products, such as PCs with network or dial-up Internet connections. Common lifestyle... — Jerry Fiddler

[Editor's Notebook]
Neural Electronics Breed Hope For Widening Computer Access
Where art Thou?" Answered Adam, "Here I am." This interaction between God and Adam in the Garden of Eden in the Bible's Old Testament has a direct relationship to an important aspect of today's rush to Internet connectivity. In this... — Patrick Mannion

[Letters]
Letters
Which Filter Can Get The Job Done? I've just read the "Simple AC Stop, DC Pass Circuit" by Ankur Bal and Abha Jain in the Sept. 7, 1999 issue of ED (p. 112). I'm not sure if the authors realise what they've... — Various

[The Design Factory]
Be Careful When Specifying Shared Components
Imagine that a large software company has created a major new operating system and wants to maximize the use of shared components. For the sake of argument, let's call these items DLLs. This company believes that the shared components will reduce... — Don Reinertsen

[40 Years Ago]
Special Report: Design In The 60's
Electronic progress in the next 10 years will revolve around the solid-state art. Packaging, computers, communications, production, navigation and guidance will be affected. Every area of electronics will owe to the researchers in solid state a good... — Steve Scrupski

[40 Years Ago]
Editorial: Goals For The 60's
"Design in the 60's" in this issue points up the fact that by 1970, the electronics industry may be radically different not only in size but in character from the one of today. We would like to hazard a guess and say that adapting to technical... — Steve Scrupski

[Forefront]
Ultra-Thin Gate Oxide And Direct Tunneling Improve Flash Write/Erase Performance
The combination of an ultra-thin gate oxide and a novel sidewall control-gate structure that suppresses gate-leakage currents promises high-speed write/erase operations at low voltages. This new structure, developed by Fujitsu Laboratories Ltd.,... — Dave Bursky

[Forefront]
TI's DSP Roadmap Promises 3 Trillion Instructions Per Second By 2010
At last month's IEDM conference, Texas Instruments' senior fellow and new business development manager Gene Frantz unveiled a DSP technology roadmap that promises 3 trillion instructions per second (TIPS) by 2010. This would be 230 times more... — Ashok Bindra

[Forefront]
Thermal Actuator Ruggedizes Fast Optical MEMS Router
The potential of optical microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) in the context of optical switching was recently underscored by the release of Lucent's WaveStar LambdaRouter. According to the company, this device is capable of directing 10 times... — Patrick Mannion

[Forefront]
Modular SiGe BiCMOS Device Exploits 0.25-μm CMOS Technology
R>esearchers at Lucent Technologies' Bell Laboratories have successfully combined bipolar transistors based on silicon germanium (SiGe) with the leading-edge 0.25-µm CMOS process to create a modular biCMOS technology. By adding just four mask... — Ashok Bindra

[Forefront]
Joint-Development Effort Focuses On JPEG2000 Codec
The University of British Columbia (UBC) and Image Power Inc., both located in Vancouver, B.C., will jointly produce a new wavelet color codec compliant with Part 1 of the JPEG2000 working committee draft (CD). They also will team up to develop... — Cheryl Ajluni

[Forefront]
Extra Aluminum Enhances Power Handling of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs
By employing a high aluminum doping value, researchers at Nitres Inc., Goleta, Calif., have significantly enhanced the power output and power efficiency of high-electron-mobility transistors (HEMTs) based on gallium nitride (GaN). The... — Dave Bursky

[Forefront]
Composite Computer Takes 44th-Fastest Slot
It resembles something a hacker—okay, an ambitious hacker—may put together in his garage. Even so, Sandia's Cplant Cluster was speedy enough to take the 44th position on the 1999 list of the 500 fastest computers in the world.... — Richard Gawel

[Forefront]
Cholesteric Display Readies E-Book For Battlefield
Cholesteric liquid-crystal display (LCD) technology developed by Kent Displays, Kent, Ohio, is going into an electronic book with the power efficiency, image quality, and night-vision compatibility required in military applications. A joint effort... — David G. Morrison

[Forefront]
Two SFF Fiber-Optic Connectors In Contention
IBM Microelectronics, Lucent Technologies' Microelectronics Group, Methode Electronics, MRV Communications, and Sumitomo Electric Lightwave have announced their intentions to introduce small-form-factor (SFF) fiber-optic components that use the LC... — David G. Morrison

[Forefront]
Pilot Program Investigates IP Internet Exchange
A pilot program is now under way to develop standards and tools for handling virtual component (VC) information exchanges between VC providers, catalog providers, and VC users via the Internet. The program was organized through the Virtual Component... — Cheryl Ajluni

[Forefront]
New Partnership Focuses On SystemC-Based Design Flow
In an effort to develop an advanced system-level-design solution for complex system-on-a-chip (SoC) designs, Synopsys Inc., Mountain View, Calif., and Europe-based STMicroelectronics have joined forces. This three-year partnership comes on the heels... — Cheryl Ajluni

[Forefront]
Bluetooth Transceiver Consumes Under 20 mW
Bluetooth offerings are starting to hit critical mass, with a slew of companies readying their version for release this quarter. This makes analysts' predictions of a late 2000 or early 2001 time frame for fully enabled product introductions appear... — Patrick Mannion

[Forefront]
Processor Eases Inexpensive Internet-Protocol Phone Design
The Audacity-T2 IP Telephone Processor combines all of the digital-processing circuitry required for a full-function, Internet protocol (IP) telephone on one chip. Telephony-equipment manufacturers can use it to build cost-effective, high-quality... — Richard Gawel

[Forefront]
Single-Chip Tuner Rids Cable Modems Of Bulky Tin-Can Boxes
The cost, power consumption, and size of cable modems have dropped steadily as integration and manufacturing processes have improved. However, the familiar, bulky, metal-can tuner that houses the sensitive, RF mixed-signal components has stubbornly... — Patrick Mannion

[Forefront]
Company Wire
Intercept Technology recently acquired the intellectual property assets of ESA Design Inc. This move adds parametric symbol and geometry generation technology to Intercept's Pantheon software product family. Designers, then, will be able... — Staff

[Real-World Engineering]
Good Work Goes A Long Way, But Persuasivesness Also Helps
Say there are two groups, A and B. To be in group A, you must meet four requirements. The first is that you have to be independently wealthy. You also have to be satisfied working only on projects that you can pay for by yourself. You can't care... — Lawrence J. Kamm

[Heads Up]
Microdisplays: The End Of The Beginning
One year ago, I wrote a column on microdisplays that covered why they're important and what products they might soon impact. Since then, I've written a lot more columns on this hot technology. Now, however, it's time to go in a different direction.... — Chris Chinnock

[New Products]

• Tool Set Gives Designers High-Performance Results — Richard Gawel

• Symbolic Simulation Products Tackle Functional Verification — Richard Gawel

• Angle-Free Autorouter Boosts Completion Rates — Richard Gawel

• Multiple-Output Regulators Take Aim At ACPI Motherboards — Richard Gawel

• Power MOSFET Trims Footprint While Raising Power Dissipation — Richard Gawel

• Device Combines DC-DC Converter With ACPI Switch And 5-Bit DAC — Richard Gawel

• Accurate Voltage Reference Has Low Temperature Coefficient — Richard Gawel

• Magnetic Field Sensor Boasts ±1% Linearity Over ±15 mT — Richard Gawel

• Transducer Series Comes In Five Displacement Ranges — Richard Gawel

• Reliable Liquid Sensors Require No External Power — Richard Gawel

• Pressure Transducer Monitors Specialty Gas Processes — Richard Gawel

• BGA Prototyping Adapter Achieves 1.0-mm Pitch — Richard Gawel

• Timing Analysis Package Has Three Signal-Jitter Views — Richard Gawel

• JTAG Controller Supports Test And ISP Applications — Richard Gawel

• 24-bit,192-kHz DAC Targets Consumer Audio — Richard Gawel

• Quad Comparator With 4.5-ns Delay Squeezes Into SO-8 Footprint — Richard Gawel

• Six-Channel ADC Geared For Data-Acquisition Applications — Richard Gawel

• IC Pair Improves Jitter Performance With 2-ps Maximum Generation — Richard Gawel

• ADC Consumes Just 79 mW From A Single 3-V Supply — Richard Gawel

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