PCB Layout

A high-quality PCB layout involves component placement that allows tight routing, ensures low EMI, and satisfies mechanical constraints. Browse our library of resources to learn strategies for successful PCB layout.

The Best Multilayer PCB Design Tips for Circuit Board Layout Doing something new for the first time can be difficult. Baby birds probably don’t appreciate being pushed out of the nest and teenagers are nervous before their first real date. I, personally, was scared to death on my first date. However, I’m glad that I took that first step because that milestone was a great moment in my life. Designing your first multilayer PCB board may not be quite like a first date, but it's still a critical step for a PCB Read Article

Testing the Limits of Your LDO's Efficiency The efficiency of your LDO isn’t a fixed value, but neither is your maximum current output. Read about your LDO efficiency curve to better see why LDOs have narrow operating ranges. Read Article

Circuit Diagram Maker: Your Guide to Building with Altium Designer Some PCB design software packages make you feel like you’ve been bamboozled. On one hand, you’re told that you’ll have access to tools that will let you move through the entire design process. Then all of a sudden, you can’t finish your design without purchasing critical features as add-ons. Only Altium Designer integrates all the best circuit design tools in a single program. You can get access to free versions that includes critical design Read Article

Designing and Simulating a Photodiode Circuit for Your PCB Your design tools should give you an easy way to create circuit diagrams, simulate electrical behavior, and start a new PCB layout. A photodiode circuit is important in many applications, ranging from simple ON/OFF light detection to receiving digital data in an optical fiber. These semiconductor devices are similar to a regular diode, but they can be difficult to simulate without the right component models and circuit design tools.With Altium Read Article

Quickly Replicate Circuits with a Connection Room in Your PCB Layout Modern PCB designs can get very complex, and designers need tools to help them stay organized. Schematic sheets are a great start, but simply organizing different circuit blocks into different schematics is not enough to ensure your designs are organized. Altium Designer unifies your schematic design and PCB layout tasks into a single program, and it includes a PCB connection rooms feature to keep your circuit blocks synchronized. Here’s how you Read Article

Switched-Mode Power Supply PCB Layout Guidelines Create and simulate your design and follow these switched-mode power supply PCB layout guidelines. Read Article

Should You Route Signals in Your PCB Power Plane? Before you cut up your PCB power plane with signals, pay attention to things like impedance control power plane current capacity to ensure reliability. Read Article

How to Use Input Impedance in Circuits and Transmission Lines The concept of input impedance is used to understand power transfer and matching in complex interconnects. Read Article

Altium Designer Helps You Track Reference Designators on Your PCB Make sure you use the right reference designators in your PCB and in your drawings, schematic sheets, and circuit board layout. Read Article

The Best EDA Software for PCB Design You don’t have time for underperforming tools that are difficult to learn and use, you need the best EDA software for PCB design that you can get; Altium Designer. ALTIUM DESIGNERThe most powerful, modern and easy-to-use PCB design tool for professional use.You’ve got a job that needs to be done and that means the printed circuit board design is your responsibility. You don’t have time for PCB design tools that are underpowered and second rate Read Article

How Total Harmonic Distortion Affects Your Power System Total harmonic distortion is used to quantify the quality of power that reaches your electronics. Read Article

What is High Speed Design? Learn more about what is high speed design and how to successfully design and route your high speed PCB layout. Read Article

How to Compare PCB Manufacturing Services for Your Board Do you know what to look for in PCB manufacturing services? Here are some of the important points to consider before placing your next order. Read Article

What is RF Circuit Design? Learn more about what is RF circuit design and how to succeed at RF PCB design and layout. Read Article

What is the Difference Between ECAD and MCAD? Mark Harris gives us an introduction to the difference between ECAD and MCAD in this article. Use the best PCB design software for ECAD/MCAD integration. Read Article

SMPS PCB Layout Guidelines in Altium Designer We’ve got the SMPS PCB layout guidelines you need for power regulation in Altium Designer. Read Article

EMI Shielding Techniques You Can Use in Your PCB Design Software Electromagnetic interference (EMI) is such a problem that governments around the world have placed limits on the amount of EMI an electronic device is allowed to generate or receive. Your electronic device needs to be designed to prevent unintentional radiation and suppress conducted noise up to a very high frequency value. This is not a simple matter of adding filtering on every circuit in your PCB layout, it’s about considering the entire Read Article