News & Updates
Ergonomics and convenience are important issues when designing a printed circuit board and the device as a whole. A lot of Altium Designer tools are aimed at solving them. These include Countersink and Counterbore holes, which allow the use of various types of screws in the mounting holes of the board.
The development of electronic devices always involves the release of many different types of files. And these files are not static - they change as the project progresses. When filling a project with data, a user creates new files, modifies outdated files that have become irrelevant. Managing project data is a separate task, especially for large developments where several participants with different specializations are involved in the process.
High-speed PCBs often require tuning groups of tracks, both single and differential. Altium Designer includes powerful tools that allow you to solve such tasks quickly and with high quality. Study this document and achieve the desired result even faster.
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.
There is one confusion related to impedance matching that comes up again and again, and it appears to be a fundamental confusion between reflection and power delivery. This leads to an apparent contradiction that arises when we try to generalize power delivery to wave reflection, despite the fact that the two were not meant to be related.
Routing is one of the most time-consuming stages of PCB design. Altium Designer has a large set of tools that allow you to do it as accurately and quickly as possible. This document will help you to learn how to manage your routing effectively and use it to its fullest extent.
RF systems operate with specific impedance values across entire interconnects, including on PCBs. Not all RF components are packaged in integrated circuits with defined impedances, so impedance matching circuits and line sections are needed to ensure signal transmission between different sections of an interconnect. One of these impedance matching techniques is the quarter-wave impedance transformer, which can be implemented as a printed trace with specific impedance.
We are happy to announce that the Altium Designer 22.10 update is now available. Altium Designer 22.10 continues to focus on improving the user experience, as well as performance and stability of the software, based on feedback from our users. Check out the key new features in the What's New section on the left side of this window!
A staff member at a PCB manufacturer once explained to me that they thought we were having an issue with a package warping. Unfortunately, component warping can occur both in a PCB and in components. In this article, we'll give an overview of warpage in a PCB, specifically in the circuit board and in the components.
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.
If you're designing a wireless IoT device, and you know how to calculate the link budget, you can reasonably estimate whether your signal will reach its destination and be read by the receiver. To calculate the link budget, the designer needs to know something about all other sources of gain and loss in the system. Once link budget is determined, the designer can judge whether some modification is needed in their RF signal chain.
Explore the future of wire bonding, from new applications to cost-saving trends, in this article by Samer Aldhaher. Stay updated on key innovations in this essential connection technology.
Discover how Altium 365’s Jira integration can streamline collaboration and keep projects running smoothly with real-time design updates and task tracking. Perfect for teams seeking efficiency!
Discover how integrating BOM management and CAD systems can streamline your PCB design process in this insightful article. Learn how combining these tools enables smoother collaboration, reduces errors, and improves design efficiency, helping you optimize your workflows from concept to manufacturing.
Resistors are fundamental components in electronic circuits, essential for controlling current and voltage. This article explores their basic principles, types, and key applications, helping you understand their crucial role in electronics.
Efficient PCB design is crucial for avoiding costly delays in product development. This article offers practical tips and best practices for PCB designers to streamline their workflows, minimize errors, and ensure timely project completion.
Signal integrity is the backbone of high-speed digital systems. In this new article by Rafał Stępień, we break down signal reflections and how to optimize your designs with effective impedance matching techniques.
In the second article of the "Mastering EMI Control in PCB Design" series Dario Fresu explores how effective component placement can reduce electromagnetic interference (EMI) in printed circuit boards. He highlights strategies such as board segregation and careful management of high-speed signals and their harmonics to ensure signal integrity and minimize emissions.
Check out this article where Rafał Stępień dives into the essentials of maintaining signal integrity in high-speed digital systems. Discover key techniques like controlling signal reflections, reducing crosstalk, and designing differential pairs in Altium Designer 24 to ensure reliable and efficient PCB performance.
The Requirements & Systems Portal is now live in Altium 365! Engineers can write, manage, and verify requirements within the Altium 365 workspace. You can link your requirements directly to schematics and PCB designs to ensure all engineers are working with the latest data. Request access today!
Looking to enhance signal integrity in your PCB designs? Check out our latest article by David Marrakchi, where he shares key strategies and best practices for achieving reliable high-speed designs.
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.
As the first article in the "Mastering EMI Control in PCB Design" series from our new asset Dario Fresu, this piece explores signal propagation in PCBs, highlighting the crucial roles of impedance, dielectric materials, and trace geometry in maintaining signal integrity.
Discover essential strategies for high-speed PCB design, focusing on signal integrity, EMI mitigation, and thermal management. Our latest article provides insights on managing crosstalk, optimizing grounding, and addressing thermal challenges to ensure reliable PCB performance.
Designing microvias with sintered paste in rigid-flex PCBs offers enhanced electrical conductivity and mechanical strength, crucial for high-density applications. Our new article explores the benefits of sintered paste and provides essential design tips to optimize microvia performance and reliability.
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.
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.