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Embedded thumbnail for Kickstart Your Rigid-Flex Journey: Part II - Altium Designer Setup for Rigid-Flex
Kickstart Your Rigid-Flex Journey
Kickstart Your Rigid-Flex Journey: Part II - Altium Designer Setup for Rigid-Flex

Learn how to set up Altium Designer for Rigid-Flex PCB projects with step-by-step guidance from Piet Callemeyn. Master both manual and automatic layer stack configuration in just a few minutes!

Embedded thumbnail for Subterranean Robots Secure Our Global Food Future
Altium Stories
Subterranean Robots Secure Our Global Food Future

After discovering the Crover effect, Lorenzo Conti developed a groundbreaking grain-swimming robot to monitor and protect stored cereals. Using Altium-powered design, this innovative technology gathers critical data beneath bulk storage surfaces, reducing waste and enhancing food security. Join us as we explore how these robots are shaping a sustainable future and safeguarding our global food supply.

Embedded thumbnail for Signal Analyzer by Keysight Tutorials - Initial Setup
Signal Analyzer by Keysight Tutorials
Signal Analyzer by Keysight Tutorials - Initial Setup

In our new tutorial series, we will explore how the upcoming Signal Analyzer by Keysight enhances signal analysis in your PCB designs. In this first part, we'll guide you through a step-by-step installation process, ensuring the extension is properly set up in your Altium Designer environment.

Blog
Favorite Tools for BOM Review

Check out our article, where Lawrence Romine shares his top tools for conducting efficient Bill of Materials (BOM) reviews in PCB design. It highlights key features in Altium 365, Octopart, and ActiveBOM that help engineers avoid unsourceable components and streamline procurement.

Embedded thumbnail for EMI Solutions for Six-Layer PCB Stackups: A PCB Designer's Guide
How-To's
EMI Solutions for Six-Layer PCB Stackups: A PCB Designer's Guide

In our brand new video, our host Zach Peterson explores essential EMI solutions for six-layer PCB stackups, ensuring your designs achieve peak performance and reliability. Stay tuned as he delves into common issues, practical tips, and a detailed Altium Designer example to help you optimize your PCB designs.

Embedded thumbnail for Elevate Your Design Skills: Tips & Tricks for Success - Recording Preview
New in Altium Designer 24
Elevate Your Design Skills: Tips & Tricks for Success - Recording Preview

Unlock essential PCB design tips and tricks in our latest webinar recording. Learn how to streamline your workflow, tackle common challenges, and boost your productivity with Altium Designer. Check the recording here: COM August Webinar.

Embedded thumbnail for Finding Alternate Microcontroller Units (MCUs): Alternate Parts Series: Pt. 4
Octopart
Finding Alternate Microcontroller Units (MCUs): Alternate Parts Series: Pt. 4

Join Phil Salmony in the next part of our series dedicated to navigating the complexities of component substitutions. In this chapter, we'll demonstrate how to use Octopart to find suitable alternate microcontroller units (MCUs). Octopart will guide you in narrowing down critical parameters, helping you select the right component for your specific application.

Embedded thumbnail for Kickstart Your Rigid-Flex Journey: Part I - Introduction to Our Walkthrough Project
Kickstart Your Rigid-Flex Journey
Kickstart Your Rigid-Flex Journey: Part I - Introduction to Our Walkthrough Project

Join Piet Callemeyn in our new 4-part series on Rigid-Flex technology! Discover the full design process, from theory to final integration—perfect for all tech enthusiasts! Catch the premiere episode where our host breaks down the theory, use cases, and stackups of Rigid-Flex technology.

Embedded thumbnail for Achieve Perfect Signal Integrity: Introducing SI Analyzer by Keysight
New in Altium Designer 24
Achieve Perfect Signal Integrity: Introducing SI Analyzer by Keysight

The new SI Analyzer by Keysight lets you run signal integrity simulations directly in Altium Designer. Designed for speed and simplicity, it features an intuitive interface and provides helpful tips for a seamless experience. Learn more in our new introduction video about this feature.

Embedded thumbnail for Altium's Role in Accelerating Muddy Machines' Farming Robots
Altium Stories
Altium's Role in Accelerating Muddy Machines' Farming Robots

Is Altium Designer and Altium 365 can help in a food production industry? The answer is YES! Check how our software helps Muddy Machines be more efficient in a farming robots development process.

Blog
Simple Strategies to Reach 10% PCB Cost Reduction

Our new article outlines strategies to achieve a 10% reduction in PCB costs by optimizing design and material choices, such as adjusting stack-up materials and hole sizes, using lower-cost parts, and considering single-sided assembly. These techniques help reduce expenses without sacrificing quality.

Embedded thumbnail for LDO Regulator Essentials: From Basics to Advanced. Part III: Stability Analysis
LDO Regulator Essentials
LDO Regulator Essentials: From Basics to Advanced. Part III: Stability Analysis

Join us for the third installment of our LDO Regulator Essentials series with Rafał Stępień. In this session, we'll dive into stability analysis using AC sweep simulations and explore how to address instabilities or phase and frequency response.

Blog
Say Goodbye to EDA Software Vendor Lock

Check how Altium 365 helps eliminate EDA software vendor lock by enabling multi-CAD support in the cloud. This allows users to work with different CAD file formats within a single platform, enhancing collaboration and reducing the need for additional licenses. This approach offers greater flexibility and is set to transform the industry.

Embedded thumbnail for Import Component Footprints Faster with Altium Designer. Part III: Supply Chain Intelligence
Import Component Footprints Faster with Altium Designer
Import Component Footprints Faster with Altium Designer. Part III: Supply Chain Intelligence

Discover how to leverage supply chain intelligence in Altium Designer! Piet Callemeyn demonstrates enhancing Manufacturer Part Search with real-time data on component availability and pricing in the last chapter of the series about component creation.

Blog
The Ultimate Introduction to High-Speed Signal Integrity for PCB Designers

High-speed signal integrity is essential in PCB design to ensure data accuracy and system reliability. Key issues like impedance mismatches, crosstalk, and signal reflections need to be addressed through strategies such as controlled impedance traces, differential pairs, and suitable material choices. Check out our first article of the series about this topic.

Embedded thumbnail for Robotic Harvest: Securing Our Food Future
Altium Stories
Robotic Harvest: Securing Our Food Future

See how Altium's PCB design software, including Multi-board System Design and Harness Design capabilities, supports Muddy Machines, a company building autonomous robots for use in the agriculture industry. This video demonstrates the vital role of technology in creating resilient and efficient agricultural practices for the future.

Tag
Blog
Pi.MX8 Project - Board Layout Part 1

Our exploration of the Pi.MX8 open-source computer module project progresses. In this third chapter, our focus shifts to the PCB layout preparation of the board. Key topics include defining the layerstack and component break-out routing.

Blog
PCB CoDesign Whitepaper

Design faster together with the innovative PCB CoDesign feature, exclusively available in Altium Designer. This cutting-edge functionality seamlessly integrates schematic and PCB design, facilitating concurrent work by multiple engineers on the same project. Learn more about this groundbreaking feature in our comprehensive manual.

Blog
How to Test Suspect Electronic Components

Electronic components power nearly everything in our modern lives. However, as long as there are buyers for parts, counterfeiters will persist in their endeavors. Financial losses resulting from fake components are challenging to ascertain due to enforcement limitations and the difficulty in collecting data on the issue. In this article, we demonstrate how to test and verify components in batch orders.

Blog
Design Phase – Lid Assembly Electronics Part 2

We are going deeper into lid assembly electronics in our Open Source Laptop project. In this chapter we will tackle the PCB design of the webcam board and show you how to deal with some expected challenges, such as overall small form factor of the board or breaking out the microscopic webcam image sensor.

Agile Hardware Development
Blog
5 Ways Hardware Development Is Just… Different

Explore the challenges and strategies of implementing Agile methodology in electronics hardware development. Understand key differences between hardware and software development within the Agile framework.

Blog
Flexible Circuit Assembly: Thinking Through Component Placement

The flexible circuits are ideal for applications where a thin, small, and lightweight PCB is needed. However, in such cases, challenges in assembly and fabrication often arise. This article delves into these challenges, focusing on component selection and placement and how they can significantly impact the performance of the flexible circuit in its intended application.

Blog
Coding Your Own Networked Test Equipment

Have you ever performed manual tests? If your answer is yes, you're likely aware of how laborious and time-consuming the entire process can be. Allow us to introduce you to the realm of test equipment automation. Our new step-by-step guide empowers you to write code that seamlessly configures your networked test equipment, all from the convenience of your computer.

Blog
Pi.MX8 Project – Schematic structure and component placement

We are advancing with our brand new Pi.MX8 Project. In this chapter, we delve deeper into two crucial aspects: the overall schematic and component placement on the PCB board. Don't hesitate to check it out. Additionally, you can follow this project through our workspace; the link is provided within the article.

Blog
Redefine PCB Boundaries with HDI Design

Dive into the world of High-Density Interconnect (HDI) design to enhance your projects. Explore heightened signal integrity, improved reliability, and the seamless integration of advanced technologies - all within compact and lightweight designs. Discover more about HDI on our updated feature page.

Blog
Pi.MX8 Project – Introduction and Overview

Do you have extensive knowledge about the Pi.MX8 module? We're excited to introduce a new series of articles focusing on an innovative approach to utilizing this module. In this inaugural chapter, we provide insights into the preparation for this project and detail the elements that will be used.

Tag
Embedded thumbnail for Creating Schematic Channels
How to Work with Multichannel Schematic
Creating Schematic Channels

Altium Designer makes creating single and multichannel designs effective and quick. We’ll show you how to create and annotate output and input channels in your design. 

Embedded thumbnail for Using Snapping for Primitives and Components | Draftsman Documents
How to Work with Draftsman
Using Snapping for Primitives and Components | Draftsman Documents

Snapping using the grids and snapping tools in Altium Designer’s Draftsman Editor gives you a lot of control over how you create and annotate primitives and components. We’ll show you how easy it is to use snapping in the Draftsman Editor. 

Embedded thumbnail for Pin Package Delay | High-speed Design
How To Work with High-Speed Projects
Pin Package Delay | High-speed Design

There are a few things to consider when adding and tuning signal delay to your design. Altium Designer gives you the tools to address the fine tuning for signal delay so you can easily make it work, using pin package delay. 

Embedded thumbnail for Introduction to Snapping Options
How to use Snapping
Introduction to Snapping Options

Introduction to snapping options: grids, guides, axes of objects, and snapping to objects.

Embedded thumbnail for Working with Tables | Draftsman Document
How to Work with Draftsman
Working with Tables | Draftsman Document

The Draftsman Document Editor allows you to add all your data for your design through tables. We’ll show you how to work with tables, and the various options to add and edit, such as Bill of Materials, Drill Tables, Transmission Line Tables, and custom tables. 

Embedded thumbnail for Pin Part Swapping | High-speed Design
How To Work with High-Speed Projects
Pin Part Swapping | High-speed Design

If you have a lot of traces intersecting on a single layer, but you need to minimize the amount of vias for your high speed design, you can utilize pin and part swapping. Altium Designer has tools to solve these issues, and we’ll show you how to solve them.

Embedded thumbnail for How to Route High-Speed Designs | High-Speed Design
How To Work with High-Speed Projects
How to Route High-Speed Designs | High-Speed Design

Routing for your high-speed design can be really easy with just a little preparation. We’ll walk you through the best ways to set up your routing so you can easily route your high-speed signals. 

Embedded thumbnail for How to Define A Net Class on Schematic | How To Use Altium Designer
How-To's
How to Define A Net Class on Schematic | How To Use Altium Designer

Altium Designer makes it easy to define net classes in both PCB and the schematic. We’ll show you how to define a net class in the schematic for whatever classes you need. 

Embedded thumbnail for Creating Differential Pairs in the Schematic
How to Work with Differential Pairs
Creating Differential Pairs in the Schematic

Learn how to create differential pairs on the schematic side.

Embedded thumbnail for Measuring in the PCB
How-To's
Measuring in the PCB

Altium Designer gives you fine grained control over how you measure object distances in the PCB. When spacing is such a critical aspect of board layout, this control is absolutely necessary. We'll show you how to utilize the measure distance command and measure selected objects, as well as how to measure tracks and faces of 3D bodies.

Embedded thumbnail for Quantel Laser | MCAD and ECAD Designers Collaborate with Altium
Discovering Altium 365
Quantel Laser | MCAD and ECAD Designers Collaborate with Altium

In this video, Quantel’s engineers - Jeremie Waller (Senior Electrical Engineer) is using Altium Designer for ECAD and Laine McNeil (Senior Mechanical Engineer) is using Solidworks for MCAD. They are both in an Altium 365 workspace that allows them to closely collaborate while staying in their own familiar design environment.

Embedded thumbnail for Using Free (Any) Angle Routing
How-To's
Using Free (Any) Angle Routing

In this video, you will see how Altium Designer now makes it extremely easy to create curved corners in your designs. Previously, arc-in-corner routing was only supported during interactive routing, but not in Push&Shove mode or during track sliding. The new Push&Shove engine solves this by adding arcs during push and shove and also during track sliding, which is done by switching to any angle corner mode to perform snake routing.

Embedded thumbnail for Snapping When Creating Routes
How to use Snapping
Snapping When Creating Routes

Learn how to effectively use snapping to facilitate routing.

Embedded thumbnail for How to edit or manage your board shape in Altium Designer | Rigid-flex
How to Work with Rigid-Flex PCBs
How to edit or manage your board shape in Altium Designer | Rigid-flex

Altium Designer 21 features many powerful tools for creating and editing your rigid-flex board shape. We’ll show you how to use to the board planning mode to create board shape and define regions as well as edit their properties for easy identification and functionality.

Embedded thumbnail for How Breville Innovates 4x Faster with Altium
Discovering Altium 365
How Breville Innovates 4x Faster with Altium

Learn how Breville, a consumer electronics company from Australia, was able to speed up its product development process by at least four times with Altium 365. 

Embedded thumbnail for How to use the Property Panel in Altium Designer
How-To's
How to use the Property Panel in Altium Designer

How to use the Property Panel in Altium Designer: The properties panel is your information hub for all objects in Altium Designer. Watch this video to learn how to best use the properties dialog in Altium Designer. 

Tag
The Best Way to Review Your PCB Designs
On-Demand Webinar
The Best Way to Review Your PCB Designs

It is essential to ask questions and review the design approaches used with your team. Design reviews are essential in the design process, but they can be inconvenient for team members and lack traceability or history. To create the best designs, you need review methods that are as cutting edge as the boards you're making.

Advantages of Using a Version Control System for Your Next Project
On-Demand Webinar
Advantages of Using a Version Control System for Your Next Project

Version control systems (VCS) have been around for a long time in the software world but can be surprisingly new to some folks in the electronics design industry. Version control tools are great for tracking and maintaining entire codebases without the old-school copying, pasting, zipping, and emailing steps many PCB designers use.

Ensuring First Pass Manufacturing Success
On-Demand Webinar
Ensuring First Pass Manufacturing Success

When it's time to release your project to your manufacturer, it's essential to ensure that all the necessary design aspects like assembly, BOM, and documentation are accurately and completely conveyed. Consistency is key to ensuring a successful release. Without clear release documentation, the designer faces increased risks of costly manufacturing response, time-consuming rework, or unintentional defects that can make it into the final product. 

Three Methods for Building MCAD Ready Components
On-Demand Webinar
Three Methods for Building MCAD Ready Components

One of the most difficult and frustrating things to arise when traveling to a foreign country is the language barrier. Communicating a simple greeting can sometimes seem like a big hassle. The same thing is true for different CAD tools. When your tools aren’t speaking the same language, you’re going to run into problems. Bridge this gap by building out your component libraries with everything it takes to truly define a component, including 3D models that seamlessly propagate into the PCB editor and beyond.

Article preview
On-Demand Webinar
8 Reasons to Store Your Components in Altium 365

Working with local libraries seems like a simple solution, but we often don’t take into account the added time spent maintaining libraries and sharing them between team members. There is no good way to avoid duplicate efforts with component creation and no standardization to ensure consistent naming. Worst of all, there is no way to identify the latest component revision, and library files can be easily corrupted or misplaced. This webinar showcases the advantages of component storage in Аltium 365 to resolve the issues of local libraries and component management.

High-Speed Design
On-Demand Webinar
Fundamentals of High-Speed Design

This track is for the designer who is new to high-speed layout and routing practices and wants to understand how they relate to signal integrity, and how to get started designing for high-speed digital applications.

Simple Simulation in Altium Designer
On-Demand Webinar
SPICE Simulation Made Simple

SPICE simulation saves you critical time in the prototyping phase. Understanding your simulation interface makes it simple to analyze how your circuits work in different scenarios. Altium Designer provides an intuitive, dedicated interface to support your simulation verification, setup, and analysis directly in your schematic environment. You also benefit from growing support for popular model formats, as well as generic models, simplifying circuit definition and simulation.

Article preview
On-Demand Webinar
PCB Design in Altium Designer with Differential Data Transfer

Differential data transmission lines usage can be challenging for even experienced designers. First you need to be familiar with the concepts of differential data transmission, find out why it is used, and what the potential advantage for your signal. This webinar will help you determine what part of your designs need differential pairs implementations and how to create such pairs with a given wave impedance in Altium Designer.

On-Demand Webinar
Tips & Tricks: Board Shape Creation

Being able to design a board in your ECAD environment doesn’t mean that it is manufacturable in real life. You have to make sure your CAD representation won’t have any problems in the real world by taking some precautions. For example, there are certain areas that need to be free of components and have specified clearances like your board edge. This webinar will help you get acquainted with the creation and modification of your board shape so that you can ensure manufacturability.

Component composition
On-Demand Webinar
Help Ensure The Best Designs With Component Management

There are many aspects to designing a PCB. One of the larger aspects has to do with managing your components. We all need components for our designs, but are those components in our library and designs up-to-date or even purchasable? These questions need to be answered before we can safely use them. Altium Designer® has several tools to help you manage the components in your libraries and designs.

PCB Comparison
On-Demand Webinar
Getting Started With File Comparison

One major benefit of using a version control system is the ability to compare PCB design revisions against one another. If you are comparing PCB designs, you need a version control system that is electrically intelligent. It’s important to know who made a change, and when they made it. Altium Designer® and Altium 365® make file comparison easy.

Advanced Topics in High-Speed Design
On-Demand Webinar
Advanced Topics in High-Speed Design

This track is for the engineer who understands high-speed design requirements and wants to learn design practices to help ensure signal integrity and EMC with fast digital protocols, mixed-signal boards, and high layer counts.

What’s New in Altium 365
On-Demand Webinar
What’s New in Altium 365

Now you can assess your library’s health at a glance with the Library Health dashboard, view and share your bill of materials (BOM) and view and download PDF documents, all in your web browser. We improved the existing diff and compare features, and released a new version of MCAD CoDesigner. Register for the webinar to learn more!

Design Reuse
On-Demand Webinar
Rapidly Creating New Designs And Reusing Existing Ones

It's no secret that software developers often use completed code fragments from other projects for quick and predictable results. The same can be done for PCB Design, there is no need to spend time rewiring schematics or laying out components on boards you’ve done before. Join us this webinar where we’ll go over how you can use your existing designs to create reusable design blocks, speeding up the design cycle for your future projects.

Component Management
On-Demand Webinar
Help Ensure The Best Designs With Component Management

There are many aspects to designing a PCB. One of the larger aspects has to do with managing your components. We all need components for our designs, but are those components in our library and designs up-to-date or even purchasable? These questions need to be answered before we can safely use them. If not, we could just be wasting our time designing with invalid components. Altium Designer® has several tools to help you manage the components in your libraries and designs.

Component Creation
On-Demand Webinar
Increase Productivity With Easy Component Creation

Component creation is a necessary evil when it comes to design, and it’s something we all need to do. But instead of spending hours creating your components and having them turn into a complete roadblock, let it be just a simple bump on the road. Altium Designer has several tools available to you in order to create the different aspects of a component, including the symbol, footprint, 3D model parametric data, supply chain information, and more