[Engineering Feature] Back To Nature For Next-Gen Semis
The semiconductor manufacturing community faces a plethora of challenges in the drive to keep Moore's Law alive and kicking (these we'll discuss later). Most IC technologies, such as microprocessors, memories, and logic devices, employ complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) technology, which has been around since 1963. As Gordon Moore predicted back in 1965 (with a few revisions since then), the number of semiconductor components (transistors) has doubled roughly every 18 months....
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Daniel Harris
[Technology Report] FPGAs Ride Tools Into ASIC Territory
When pondering your next-generation system design, you may ask yourself whether the spiraling mask costs have priced you out of the ASIC game. You'll perform the requisite analyses of performance requirements (high) versus cost (much higher) and begin wondering whether another implementation path might serve the end product in a more costeffective fashion. And you'll consider the notion of using FPGAs, at least for prototyping if not for production. FPGAs? Can they have the horsepower to...
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David Maliniak
[Leapfrog: First Look] LabVIEW Embraces Graphical Object-Oriented Programming
To mark the 20th anniversary of LabVIEW, along comes LabVIEW 8.20 replete with object-oriented support. If the original LabVIEW is C, LabVIEW 8.20 is C++. It's a superset based upon the original virtual-instrument (VI) methodology developed 20 years ago. LabVIEW is also one of the few graphical programming languages standing alongside UML (Universal Modeling Language) and Matlab's Simulink. Each language offers a distinctive approach and purpose, as well as its own terminology. ...
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William Wong
[Design View / Design Solution] Switched Fabrics, DDS Boost Distributed Data-Critical Systems
High performance and predictability are prerequisites for any large-scale networked system that depends on real-time data processing and analysis. Data representing actual events or system status must be evaluated while it's still relevant to tactical conditions, making it imperative to know when specific data is available, and to aggregate and evaluate that data in real time. Unreliable receipt times make effective analysis difficult or impossible. Fast and predictable performance...
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Rajive Joshi
[Ideas For Design] Digitize Thermocouple Output Near Sensing Point
The thermocouple is a popular sensor for industrial temperature measurement because it's accurate, cost-effective, widely available, and suitable for a wide range of temperatures. It consists of two wires of different metal or metal alloys, welded together at the sensing end (usually called the hot junction). The thermocouple output is a voltage difference across the other ends of the wires (called the cold junction), which must be maintained at a known temperature. If required...
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Tamer Mogannam
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[Ideas For Design] Single Solar Cell Trickle Charges 3- To 16-V Battery In-Circuit
Many battery-powered applications use very little power when idle and have short-duration operating periods. Thus, the total energy used is very small. It would be convenient to incorporate solar cells in these devices to charge the batteries. However, the number of cells needed to charge a given battery voltage is close to Vb/0.6, thereby necessitating an array of solar cells, series connected. The circuit in the figure addresses that issue by employing a...
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George Woolcott
[Ideas For Design] Cascode Configuration Removes Miller Effect, Boosts PFC Performance
The power factor corrector (PFC) front end of an off-line power supply is subject to the operating frequency limitation caused by the Miller Effect of its associated power MOSFET. This effect is a property of any transistor configuration with a common source (MOSFET) or common emitter (bipolar transistor) configuration. Most PFCs employ a boost converter based on a configuration with a common source MOSFET or common emitter power bipolar transistor. ...
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Gregory Mirsky
[Editorial] No "Failure Of Imagination" Here In Stopping Terrorism
Writing this on September 11, it would be difficult to think of a topic other than the five-year anniversary of the terrorist attacks. The morning in New Jersey is sunny and crisp, with a clear view of Manhattan, just as it had been five years ago. How could anyone set out to turn such a perfect gift of a day into one of chaos, destruction, and death? As a country, we responded with patriotism, anger, fear, and disbelief. As engineers, you responded as you do to all crises,...
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Mark David
[POV: Point Of View] High-Speed, High-Performance, High-Voltage Technologies Converge
Functionality is converging on platform devices as they become our primary conduits for voice, data, and video. This increase in functionality drives the need for more integration in both digital and analog ICs. From a process technology perspective, digital's demands are relatively straightforward: deliver more bits per area by taking advantage of advances in lithography. Analog's demands are more complex, as analog encompasses the RF interface, data conversion, and...
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Marco Racanelli
[Pease Porridge] What's All This Sallen-Key Stuff, Anyhow?
Recently, people in various publications have been pointing out that using an ordinary op amp in a Sallen-Key filter can cause problems. A typical op-amp circuit, as shown in Figure 1, can have a frequency response that rolls off nicely above 1 kHz, at 12 dB per octave, down to ?40 or ?50 dB. Then the response may roll back up or stay flat at higher frequencies. If you choose a fast op amp with high Ib, you might choose low...
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Bob Pease
[TechView: The Industry] Better Electronics Through Chemistry
Michael J. Therien, a professor of chemistry at the University of Pennsylvania, is taking a colorful approach to the chip density barriers that threaten to repeal Moore's Law. As conventional semiconductor technology reaches its natural limits, Therien believes that the future of high-speed electronics lies in "electrically jumpy" molecules known as chromophores. A chromophore is the part of a molecule that's responsible for its color. When light hits a chromophore, it excites an...
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John Edwards
[TechView: The Industry] $800 Million Market Keeps An Eye On You
The exploding market for Internet Protocol (IP) video surveillance cameras and servers will generate a nearly $800 million opportunity for semiconductors in 2010. Revenue from shipments of IP video surveillance cameras nearly doubled in 2005 and will continue to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 87.9% from 2004 to 2010 to reach $3.9 billion. By the end of 2009, the worldwide IP surveillance camera market will grow larger than the conventional closed-circuit television...
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Mark Kirstein
[TechView: Analog & Power] Hidden POLs Coming Soon?
If point-of-load (POL) regulators were small and efficient enough, you could just stick them inside the package with a processor or FPGA chip and think back to the days when chips simply ran on 12- or 5-V power bussed around a circuit board. In one stroke, all of those tiresome power design issues of sequencing and loop response would be lifted from the circuit-designer's shoulders and turned over to the chip makers. Something like that scenario got a little closer late last...
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Don Tuite
[TechView: Communications] Ethernet Channel Adapter Sets Throughput And Latency Records
NetEffect has teamed up with Fulcrum Microsystems to demonstrate what's probably the fastest 10-Gbit/s Ethernet system available. Using NetEffect's NE010x Ethernet channel adapter (ECA) and Fulcrum's 24-port FocalPoint switch chip, benchmarking tests at the Ohio Supercomputing Center demonstrated a combined end-to-end latency of less than 10 µs—a new performance record. The NetEffect ECA uses the iWARP Ethernet standard. Today, virtually all companies using high-speed...
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Louis E. Frenzel
[TechView: Embedded] ETX Modules Master Embedded Chores
ETX system modules plug into a baseboard that provides peripheral interfaces and connectors. Custom baseboards often are the typical route for designers. But standard baseboards like Kontron's ETX miniBaseboard usually are sufficient, easier to obtain, and economical enough for production products (Fig. 1). The ETX miniBaseboard hides the ETX module on the bottom. It's slightly larger (130 by 155 mm) than an ETX board, and its...
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William Wong
[TechView: Digital] Reference Design Delivers All-Digital Broadcast, Display Processing For IDTV
If you're designing an IDTV processor for the ATSC market, consider using a recently released qualified reference design jointly developed by LSI Logic Corp. and Micronas. This reference design targets high-quality,-feature-rich, flat-panel integrated digital TV (IDTV). It gives TV manufacturers a stable, proven platform that enables them to quickly and cost-effectively get to market with a range of Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC) IDTVs. Additionally, the...
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Daniel Harris
[TechView: Digital] Handling Test Data Volume With 130-nm And Smaller Designs
When creating a manufacturing test set for digital designs on technology feature sizes of 130 nm and smaller, it's important to include at-speed tests. Stuckat tests have been used for many years and continue to catch a lot of manufacturing defects. However, at the smaller feature sizes of today's chips, more and more defects are timing related and aren't caught by the stuck-at test patterns. The most common at-speed tests are created using the transition fault model in...
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Bruce Swanson
[TechView: Test] Software Brings Speed, Simplicity, Automation To Equipment Testing
While test is a critical part of product development, it's getting more challenging as products get larger and more complex. Most engineers want equipment that fully automates setup, configuration, and regression, as well as other tedious tasks. Also, it should be able to quickly analyze test results for sources of failure and communicate these sources to the engineer. It should enable the testers to focus on the hard cases. And, it should test the product as it will be used in...
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Louis E. Frenzel
[TechView: EDA] Linter Weeds Bugs Out Of SystemC Code
Linters have been around for years for HDLs, but they're just now maturing for languages like SystemC. Version 2.6 of Actis Design's AccurateC code analyzer for SystemC extends the existing application programming interface (API) to allow access to internal design data in terms of SystemC constructs. These include modules, processes, variables, interfaces, and signals. AccurateC's rule-wizard function has been beefed up to make automatic rule generation easier. In addition,...
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David Maliniak
[Component View] Power Cables Meet An Array Of Needs
A complete line of power cables and cable accessories from Pulizzi Engineering features a variety of plug types and lengths. There are over 30 stock versions, including NEMA 5-15P to IEC C19, NEMA L6-20P to IEC C19, and European Shucko to IEC C19 cord sets. The variety of power cables enables one power distribution unit to be used anywhere in the world. Standard configurations include 120-, 208-, and 230-V versions available in both 15- and 20-A ...
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Lisa Maliniak
