Author Archives: richard wilson

IQE wins big wafer deal for photonic devices

IQE_SiMachine1UK-based semiconductor wafer manufacturer IQE has received a order agreement for indium phosphide (InP) materials to the value of $3.25m from an unnamed substrate manufacturer.

InP crystals, produced IQE’s facility in Milton Keynes, is the source material for the manufacture of InP wafers used in the production of photonic components for applications in infrared sensing, communications and gesture recognition.

InP is used for photonic devices due to its properties in the short wavelength infrared (IR) range commonly used for a host of sensing applications as well as high speed optical communications, high definition night vision and gesture recognition.

Dr. Drew Nelson, CEO and president of IQE commented: “The scale of this order reflects our status in the semiconductor industry for the supply of a diverse range of semiconductor materials in addition to substrates and epiwafers. This order underlines the importance of the photonic industry sector over the coming years and decades as recognised by 2015 being designated the International Year of Light”

 

richard wilson

Sebastian Conran 3D printer built from weekly magazine

Sebastian Conran

Sebastian Conran

It is now possible to build your own 3D printer to make jewellery and smartphone cases in weekly installments.

It is the novel idea of Eaglemoss Collections which has teamed up with designer Sebastian Conran to create a 3D printer which can be built in weekly installments.

The publisher claims it will be possible to use the printer to make jewellery, games, figurines and mobile phone cases.

Weekly issues will be published to build the Eaglemoss’ Vector 3 printer, with software and a website which can be used to download designs featured in the magazines, along with specially customised software to run the printer.

Sebastian Conran, founding director of Sebastian Conran Associates said: “As 3D printing technology and applications become more mainstream, 3D printers are moving from the hi-tech workshop into the home, office and shed. Recognising this trend and opportunity, we worked with Eaglemoss to develop a 3D printer that was more suitable for home use.”

The website will also include a3D Create & Print Shop where userscan purchase a variety of different coloured plastics for their printer as well as a hostof additional printer tools.

Maggie Calmels from Eaglemoss said: “This collection also allows us to utilise our unique ‘partwork’ retail model; offering people the opportunity to purchase and build their own printer at small weekly costs, while the accompanying magazine is aimed at engaging readers and giving them the chance to learn more about the science behind the product.”

672f8c0ce947efa3e69f5c9341869314

richard wilson

Cambridge manufacturer makes LEDs shine bright

imagesCambridge Nanotherm is expecting to make a strong start to 2015 with growing sales of its nanoceramic thermal management products, particularly in the LED lighting market.

Cambridge Nanotherm installed its first production line last March.

“Upgrading our systems was necessary to cope with the demand,” commented Ralph Weir, CEO of Cambridge Nanotherm. “Many electronic and LED manufacturers are starting to realise the thermal benefits of working with nanoceramics, which are simultaneously cheaper than high-end “metal PCB” materials and higher performance.”

Cambridge Nanotherm’s patented process builds a nanoceramic layer on sheets of aluminium. The material is completed by a layer of copper, and can be converted into a PCB by established manufacturers.

“The nanoceramic layer acts as a dielectric with exceptional thermal properties, removing heat up to 20% more efficiently than the competition whilst also offering significant cost savings. The upshot is an affordable thermal management substrate / PCB material that outperforms everything else in its class,” said Weir.

Thermal management is used in high brightness LEDs remove heat from the assembly, which extends lifetimes of LEDs.

 

richard wilson

WaveJet Touch oscilloscope available from Amplicon

Teledyne-LeCroy-WaveJet-Touch-oscilloscopeThe Teledyne LeCroy WaveJet Touch oscilloscope is available from Amplicon.

The oscilloscopes come in either 350MHz or 500MHz bandwidth, 2GS/s sample rate and 5Mpts long memory.

The WaveJet Touch 350MHz model is priced from £3,625.

All channels on the oscilloscope can have active digital filtering, performing low-pass, high-pass and moving average filter operations, so unwanted frequencies are removed leaving only the desired ones. While the digital filters are active math trace functions can still be used for a more thorough analysis.

The options for signal acquisition include peak detect, where the maximum and minimum sample points are saved during two waveform intervals, as well as its corresponding waveform points. This is useful for viewing narrow pulses spaced far apart.

Each of these modes have an equivalent time sampling rate of 100GSa/s; automatic measurements can be made with 26 different parameters and min/max statistics, with up to four measurements being displayed simultaneously. The oscilloscope is also able to measure all occurrences of a parameter in a single acquisition.

 

richard wilson

IKEA invests in Scotland-based printable LED light firm

curved-tileIKEA is investing in Design LED Products, the Scotland-based printable LED lighting firm.

IKEA will switch its entire lighting range to the technology by September 2015.

The investment by IKEA GreenTech is intended to support Design LED’s development of products that can be used in lighting designs for the home.

Based in Livingston near Edinburgh, Design LED creates “light tiles” which are LEDs embedded into clear resins and films. The tiles are designed to be thin, flexible and low cost.

“This technology opens up fantastic possibilities for innovative designs using energy efficient LEDs. The partnership is a clear strategic fit for IKEA and our goal to make living sustainably affordable and attractive for millions of people,”says Christian Ehrenborg, managing director, IKEA GreenTech AB.

LED lights use 85% less energy than incandescent bulbs and last 20 times longer.

“This strategic investment allows Design LED to significantly accelerate plans to deliver highly differentiated products to an international market desperate to conserve energy, and hungry for exciting new form factors in LED lighting” says Stuart Bain, CEO, Design LED Products.

Design LED Products has also recently expanded its management team with the appointment of Wolfgang Andorfer chief sales and marketing officer.

Existing Design LED Products shareholders also invested alongside IKEA GreenTech, including most significantly Scottish Enterprise, via its investment arm the Scottish Investment Bank.

 

 

 

richard wilson

Power supply OR’ing controller rated for 40V

DI0779_ZXGD3108Diodes has introduced a 40V-rated active OR’ing controller for the design of uninterruptible power supplies.

The ZXGD3108N8 is designed to drive low RDS(ON) power mosfets replacing lossy Schottky blocking diodes.

According to the supplier, by driving s in this way the controller also improves the overall system efficiency of standard 12V and 24V common rail systems. It also has a low turn-off threshold voltage.

At less than -3mV, and with a tight tolerance of ±2mV, system stability and efficiency is improved under light load conditions.

Additionally, the controller is able to sink a current of 5A, ensuring the fastest possible discharge of the paralleled OR’ing mosfets.

At just 600ns, turn-off is fast to avoid reverse-current flow and prevent voltage dropping on the common rail. In a typical 12V configuration, device quiescent current is specified as sub 400µA and standby power consumption less than 5mW.

 

richard wilson

USB scopes work with BeagleBone Black and Raspberry Pi

1111picotechPico Technology has released beta drivers for its oscilloscope and data logging devices to run on the ARM-based BeagleBone Black and Raspberry Pi development boards.

The USB oscilloscopes and data loggers include high-speed oscilloscopes with bandwidths up to 500MHz, high-resolution 12-bit and 16-bit oscilloscopes, and deep-memory oscilloscopes with buffer sizes up to 512Msamples.

The data logger range includes multichannel voltage loggers, 8-channel thermocouple loggers and the educational DrDAQ multifunction logger.

Separate driver packages and snippets of C code are available for Raspbian and Debian systems. Similar code could be developed in C-compatible programming languages such as C++, Java and JavaScript.

As beta products, these drivers are explained and supported.

Beta drivers for Mac OS X and Linux, drivers for Microsoft Windows and a free SDK can also be downloaded free of charge.

 

richard wilson

Distributors build design software download momentum

DesignSpark PCB

Designspark PCB

Online distributors want engineers to get their design software from them. All of it will be downloadable from the distributors’ websites and some of it, not all, will be free.

It was called the great design tool giveaway, which is not strictly true, at the Electronica exhibition in Munich last week.

Many of the design tools are integrated into the distributors’ own websites with the aim of combining the specification and purchasing of components in one step.

“The aim is that the engineer does not have to leave the design tool to find the parts they need, it is all one environment,” Dave Doherty vice-president operations Digi-Key told Electronics Weekly.

Farnell element1 4 will be selling its software and tools, including CadSoft Eagle, via a new web portal in 2015.

“It is an extension of what we have offered in the past. It will help designers match the OS and firmware with specific MCUs and vice-versa,” said Mike Powell Technical Development Manager at Farnell element14.

“There is a lot more for us than being just a one-stop-shop for components,” said Graham Maggs, European marketing director at Mouser.

Building a software business is not a simple task for the distributors. Today they are selling PCB design tools, the OS and assorted firmware. The ultimate goal is the application software, which will allow them to see complete reference designs ‘off-the-shelf’.

“We see it as supporting the engineer in different ways, but it won’t come overnight,” said Maggs. “Software download is a challenge for distributors, but it is a necessary capability.”

The distributors demonstrated their latest software and downloadable tools at the exhibition last week.

Mouser Electronics has launched a community website for design engineers with the MultiSIM BLUE free PCB design tool, developed by National Instruments, at its heart.

The NI MultiSim Component Evaluator Mouser edition uses the Berkeley SPICE simulation engine and includes a preloaded component library from the distributor’s linecard.

Farnell element14 plans to start selling next year on is software design centre Altium’s PCB design tool called CircuitStudio, which includes management and a 3D design capability.

Distributors are also offering basic grade free tools as a download, as well as selling professional level tool.

Mouser has a free PCB design tool as does RS which was first into the free tool market with DesignSpark PCB.

Digi-Key, which has free tools created by Aspen Labs, called Scheme-It, PartSim and PCBWeb, also sells tools created by Mentor Graphics.

The Designer Schematic and Designer Layout tools are new tools, based on its PADS enterprise-level PCB design tool, but with price tags to attract hobbyists and small-budget design teams.

Designer Schematic and Designer Layout come with free access to Mentor Graphics’ PartQuest, a fully integrated website that merges Digi-Key part numbers into symbols and footprints.

 

richard wilson

Tabor intros a 1GHz generator on PXIe

Tabor-pxieTabor Electronics has introduced a 1GHz IQ arbitary waveform generator (AWG) in a dual slot PXI Express (PXIe) module.

Jonathan Netzer, Tabor Electronics product marketing manager claims it is “the fastest PXIe based IQ AWG”.

Equipped with 2.3GS/s, 14 bit clock (typically 2.5GS/s) and 1GHz output stage, the 52592 is designed for high bandwidth IQ applications.

For applications needing only one IF signal, the new design also can be order in a single channel version, under the model number 52591.

The generator has 32M of arbitrary memory, a choice of sampling modes including NRZ and RZ and 5ps skew control between channels.
 

richard wilson

FPGA makes supercomputer run faster

IBM_POWER8Altera and IBM have designed an FPGA-based reconfigurable processor to improve the performance of supercomputers.

The firms have created the first FPGA-based accelerator for a POWER8 CPU which features shared virtual memory between the FPGA and processor and so improves system performance in high-performance computing (HPC) and data centre applications for data compression, encryption, image processing and search.

Altera and IBM are presenting several POWER8 systems that are coherently accelerated using FPGAs at SuperComputing 2014.

FPGAs are connected to the POWER8 CPU using IBM’s Coherent Accelerator Processor Interface (CAPI). This makes the FPGA appear as simply another core on the POWER8 processor.

The expectation is this will shorten development time by greatly reducing lines of software code and reduced processor cycles versus conventional IO attached accelerators. A single FPGA-accelerated POWER8 server is able to operate at industry-leading levels of efficiency, allowing system architects to cut their data center footprint in half.

“With rapidly changing workloads, it is imperative we build in flexible accelerators to make IBM POWER processors more efficient in IBM Power Systems and all OpenPOWER compatible systems,” said Brad McCredie, vice president of IBM Power development and OpenPOWER president.

“The work Altera has done to provide FPGA-based reconfigurable hardware acceleration to our POWER processors enabled through CAPI allows software developers to build highly efficient, highly flexible, performance optimised systems,” said MCCredie.

Altera and IBM have worked with board partner Nallatech to develop an OpenPOWER CAPI development kit for POWER8 that features Nallatech’s FPGA-based 385 card, the industry’s first CAPI FPGA accelerator card.

richard wilson