Digital transformation means many things to many people, but regardless of who you are or what you do, it\u2019s important to have an understanding of the overall impact it has had on PCB design and manufacturing. In the past five years, our industry has seen the emergence of an entirely new manufacturing process that leverages advanced semiconductor technology and equipment to produce end products in remarkably faster and more efficient ways than ever before.
\nPCB design goes far beyond simply ensuring that the PCB has all of the right elements on it, it\u2019s an extremely critical factor in whether or not the final product will succeed or fail in the marketplace. This article will discuss five of the most important features that you should always include in your Printed Circuit design to increase its chances of succeeding in the market.<\/p>\n

1) Embedded Systems<\/h5>\n

The biggest issue with embedded systems is that since we\u2019re using digital devices for sensing and control, we need to worry about electromagnetic interference or EMI from other devices. This requires not only shielding and grounding but also capacitors in series with any power or signal lines that may have high switching currents. In addition, it can require filtering on any data line to prevent noise issues.<\/p>\n

In some cases, it might even require active components such as an EMI filter or optoisolator between two circuits that shouldn\u2019t ever share a common ground potential. Though there are lots of things to consider when designing a new system, four key elements are essential when designing your next embedded system, such as<\/p>\n

EMI Shielding and Grounding:<\/strong> since you are using digital components on your Printed Circuit Board<\/a><\/strong>, there is a risk of electromagnetic interference (EMI) that can interfere with signals and cause incorrect readings or even damage the sensitive components. To prevent these issues, it\u2019s important to use shielding whenever possible and ground all your devices separately from one another.<\/p>\n

Power Distribution:<\/strong> Since many devices will be drawing power from a single source, it’s important to make sure everything has its dedicated current path so nothing gets overloaded or damaged due to shared current paths between devices on your circuit board.<\/p>\n

High-Speed Signals:<\/strong> If you plan to move data over any high-speed interfaces, then special care must be taken to design them properly. In addition to ensuring good grounding practices are used for optimal signal integrity, special care must also be taken with PCB trace widths, as well as keeping impedance levels low through proper trace length and material selection.<\/p>\n

Sensors & Input Devices:<\/strong> With analog systems, sensors were often free since they could usually tap directly off of existing power lines. But, now that we’re dealing with digital systems, many sensors require either specialized voltage regulators or their separate supply rails altogether. Not only do they require their supply rail, but sometimes they might even require additional processing before being able to generate useful information for us.<\/p>\n

2) Low-Power & High-Performance Computing<\/h5>\n

The more you can do with a limited amount of power, space, and money, the more valuable your product is to users. FPGAs (field-programmable gate arrays) are tools that let engineers reprogram individual chips in order to handle specific computing tasks. The result? Microcontrollers or CPUs that are faster and can process greater amounts of data than they would be able to otherwise.
\nIf there\u2019s one thing you know about digital transformation, it\u2019s that speed is everything. If a chip takes too long to compute, then what\u2019s being computed isn\u2019t worth much anymore. By making microcontrollers perform like high-performance computers, FPGAs help drive down costs while also increasing the value for the end-users.
\nIn addition to general processor performance enhancements, many people look at DSPs as a means of lowering power consumption in their products. DSPs excel at using less energy by processing the audio signals or video images through filters designed to cut out unnecessary information from signal processing circuits. They allow device manufacturers to keep devices running longer without having to worry about recharging them\u2014and when these devices need charging, it takes less time because DSPs can run on lower voltages than processors traditionally used for signal processing applications.<\/p>\n