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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.

Design Reuse Blocks Update
Blog
Altium Designer 22.9 Update

We are happy to announce that the Altium Designer 22.9 update is now available. Altium Designer 22.9 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!

Dual Rail Voltage Supply
Blog
Dual Rail Voltage Supply

The highest performing operational amplifiers often need a split supply with positive and negative voltages connected to the op amps supply rails. In this project, we’re going to be building a positive/negative dual rail power supply for a differential oscilloscope probe I’m designing. I’m making the power supply a separate project, as a dual rail supply is quite useful to have, and I’m sure I’ll find multiple uses for it in the future.

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How-To's
Show the Net Connections Between Select Components

This video demonstrates how to show net-specific component connections. This is helpful when routing as you’re able to reduce clutter and focus on the connections on which you are working.

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How to Work with Draftsman
Draftsman Editor Settings

In this video we’ll go over the Draftsman editor settings and properties so you know how to set up the editor to be exactly what you need.

Library Importer Interface
Blog
Library Importer Improvements (former Library Migrator)

Importing file-based libraries from your local computer or network drive to your Altium 365 workspace can be done using the Library Importer. Altium’s Library Migrator was renamed Library Importer—the feature’s name was changed to conform more closely to the tool’s purpose. Not only is its name new, but our team has also made several user experience improvements. We have updated the documentation to reflect this change.

Blog
How to Select Copper Foil for High-Frequency PCB Design

The PCB materials industry has spent significant amounts of time developing materials that provide lowest possible signal loss for products with RF applications. For high speed and high frequency designs, losses will limit signal propagation distance and distort signals, and it will create an impedance deviation that can be seen in TDR measurements. In this article, we'll look at the balance between copper foil losses and other types of losses in a PCB, as well as some strategies that are commonly used to overcome roughness.

Embedded thumbnail for Assuring Your Board Is Large Enough to House All Components
How-To's
Assuring Your Board Is Large Enough to House All Components

This video covers how to make sure your board is big enough to house all your components.

Blog
Altium Designer 22.8 Update

We are happy to announce that the Altium Designer 22.8 update is now available. Altium Designer 22.8 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!

What is Hybrid Beamforming?
Blog
What is Hybrid Beamforming?

In this article, we’ll look at beamforming implementation in an advanced method combining analog and digital techniques, known as hybrid beamforming. This method blends both digital and analog techniques to create multiple beams and thus reach multiple users with varying intensities. In the case of an RF imaging system or a radar system, hybrid beamforming in a MIMO technique also allows tracking of multiple targets with adjustable resolution.

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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.

Is your via impedance calculator accurate?
Blog
Why Most Via Impedance Calculators Are Inaccurate

The problem with every via impedance calculator that I have seen is simple: they are incomplete or totally wrong. The “incomplete” part refers to a lack of context; these calculators can roughly reproduce a well-known estimate from a legend like Howard Johnson in his Digital Design textbooks. However, these calculators never provide insight into what they are actually calculating, or where the calculated via impedance is accurate. Keep reading to see why these calculators get it so wrong, as well as the context surrounding via impedance.

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How-To's
How to Create an Interactive PDF of a Schematic Diagram

This video shows how to create an interactive PDF using the Smart PDF Wizard.

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How to Work with Draftsman
What is the Draftsman Document?

Once your PCB layout is finished it’s time for review. This is where the Draftsman Document and Altium Designer’s Draftsman Editor comes in.

Blog
Buck Converter Simulation in Altium Designer

When designing high power circuits (usually very high voltage and/or current), you’ll need to create a regulator from scratch and place it in your PCB layout. It's also the case that you may want to model a real component using discretes in a simulation in order to qualify the system's expected operating regime. As part of buck converter design, you can easily run a buck converter simulation directly in Altium Designer’s schematic editor. Here’s how you can access these features in the newest version of Altium Designer. 

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How to work with Multiboard
Adding Project Modules to a Multi-board Schematic

If you’re using multiple PCBs in your Multi-board design, Altium Designer allows you to add existing projects directly to your schematic with modules. We’ll show you how to quickly and efficiently add these projects to your Multi-board design.

PCIe 6.0 Overview
Blog
Overview of the PCIe 6.0 Standard

Just as you get used to PCIe 5.0, they decide to release another standard! The newest iteration of PCIe is Gen6, or PCIe 6.0. PCIe 6.0 brings a doubling of channel bandwidth through introduction of PAM-4 as the signaling method in high-speed differential channels. This signaling method is a first for PCIe, and it’s an important enabler of the doubled data rate we see in the current standard. In this article, I’ll run over the important points in the standard and what PCB designers can expect when designing these channels.

Embedded thumbnail for Checking for Creepage in High Voltage Designs
How-To's
Checking for Creepage in High Voltage Designs

High voltage devices have leakage currents that propage over the surface of the board. In such devices, it's important to consider not only the standard gap between the two topological elements, but also the shortest possible path between them, taking into account cut-outs and holes. With Altium Designer 20, you can check for creepage using the new creepage distance rule.

Embedded thumbnail for Creating BGA Footprints with the Footprint Wizard
How to create a PCB Footprint
Creating BGA Footprints with the Footprint Wizard

Altium Designer makes it easy to create a BGA footprint using our IPC compliant footprint wizard. We'll show you how easily you can create and modify a BGA footprint using the footprint wizard.

SPI vs. I2C For Memory Access
Blog
SPI vs. I2C: How to Choose the Best Protocol for Your Memory Chips

One of the common implementations of SPI and I2C in a PCB layout is as a protocol for reading and writing to an external Flash memory. Flash chips are a very common component in embedded systems and can offer high capacities of non-volatile memory up to Gb values. When choosing a memory chip, you'll want to match the application requirements and functionality with the bus speed you need for read and write operations in your memory chip. There is also the matter of the type of Flash memory you'll need to access (NOR vs. NAND).

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Blog 4月 22, 2020
Any Angle Routing: When Should You Use It?

EDA tools have come a long way since the advent of personal computing. Now advanced routing features like auto-routers, interactive routing, length tuning, and pin-swapping are helping designers stay productive, especially as device and trace densities increase. Read full article in our blog:

Blog 3月 20, 2020
A Message from Altium on COVID-19

We understand that many of you, like ourselves, have transitioned to working remotely. This process comes with its challenges and we would like to offer all and any help we can to minimize disruptions for your teams and business.

Blog 3月 2, 2020
About Altium Designer Home Page

With the new Altium Designer Home page, we are aiming to help users stay up to date with the latest features and productivity tricks available in Altium Designer. Learn more about the Home page in this documentation article.

altium-community-forum
Blog 2月 25, 2020
Getting Connected: Altium’s User Community Forums

The Altium design environment is a complex and sophisticated set of software tools. Not surprisingly, becoming proficient with these tools will take some time, and you’ll need to practice every step of the design process from beginning to end. So what happens if you get stuck along the way?

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Embedded thumbnail for Stackup Creation and editing
How to work with Layer Stack Manager
Stackup Creation and editing

This video shows how to view and edit the PCB Layer Stack, select materials and add new layers

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How to create a PCB Footprint
Configuring Your PCB Library

It is important to have accurate footprints to manufacture your PCB. Learn how to configure your PCB library to facilitate footprint creation.

Global parameters
What's New in 22.6
Quick Browsing of Parameters for a Board

Parametric information for your board is now conveniently available from the Properties panel. A single, convenient location with which to browse system, calculated and user-defined parameters, and place as needed in the form of special strings.

Global parameters
What's New in 22.6
电路板参数的快速浏览

您现在可以从Properties面板中轻松获得电路板的参数信息。可以在一个方便的位置,浏览系统、计算和用户定义参数,并根据需要以特殊字符串的形式进行放置。

Embedded thumbnail for How to Validate Links Between Components and Footprints
How-To's
How to Validate Links Between Components and Footprints

Before importing or updating data from the circuit to the board, you must first verify that all components of the circuit are associated with Footprint. Watch this video to learn how to validate the links between your schematic components and footprints.

Embedded thumbnail for How to use Copy Room Format
How to work with Rooms
How to use Copy Room Format

Rooms allow you to use rules on specific areas of your design. This helps immensely with properly defining trace widths and hole sizes for specific components. We’ll show you how easy it is to assign rules to specific rooms in the PCB.

Embedded thumbnail for How To Do Versioning And Releases by Robert Feranec and Michal Faruga
Discovering Altium 365
How To Do Versioning And Releases by Robert Feranec and Michal Faruga

Meet Robert Feranec in an educational video on version control, project history, comments, comparison and other features in Altium Designer 

Active Links in Text
What's New in 22.6
Active Links in Text

You can now specify active links to components and nets within a text frame object on a schematic. This handy navigation aid makes it much easier not only to read the document, but also to work with it.

Active Links in Text
What's New in 22.6
文本中的活动链接

您现在可以在原理图上的文本框对象中,指定指向元件和网络的活动链接。使用此导航辅助工具,即可轻松读取和处理文档。

Multifunctional Pins
What's New in 22.6
Multifunctional pins

You will often see that modern ICs consist of multi-functional pins. In this latest version of Altium Designer it has become far easier and much more convenient to work with such components.

Multifunctional Pins
What's New in 22.6
多功能引脚

常见的现代IC均由多功能引脚组成。在最新版Altium Designer中,我们能够更加轻松、方便地处理此类元件。

Embedded thumbnail for Using Rooms in Rules
How to work with Rooms
Using Rooms in Rules

Rooms allow you to use rules on specific areas of your design. This helps immensely with properly defining trace widths and hole sizes for specific components. We’ll show you how easy it is to assign rules to specific rooms in the PCB.

Embedded thumbnail for Creating a Schematic Symbol: Dealing with Power Pins
How to create a Schematic Symbol
Creating a Schematic Symbol: Dealing with Power Pins

Multiple schematic symbols often require the use of multiple power and ground pins. We’ll show you the difference between hidden and visible power pins, and the various methods you can use to use them in your design however it works best for you.

Embedded thumbnail for Allowing Permanent Display of Some Layers
How-To's
Allowing Permanent Display of Some Layers

This video demonstrates how to permanently display some layers in the PCB using the View configuration panel.

Embedded thumbnail for Creating Rooms in the PCB
How to work with Rooms
Creating Rooms in the PCB

If you want to create a room manually in the PCB or have them generated for the Schematic, Altium Designer allows you to create custom rooms. We’ll show you how to hand draw different rooms, how to create rooms by defining them through the room definition, and how to have them generated for the schematic and pushed through to the PCB by the Engineering Change Order.

Embedded thumbnail for Creating a Schematic Symbol - Placing Designators and Comments
How to create a Schematic Symbol
Creating a Schematic Symbol - Placing Designators and Comments

Placing your designator or comments can be done automatically, but that doesn’t mean they’re visible. We’ll walk you through how to make them visible and position them correctly no matter what orientation your symbol is with automatic positioning.

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