Electronic Design UPDATE: September 7, 2005

==================================

Electronic Design UPDATE e-Newsletter
Electronic Design Magazine
PlanetEE ==> www.planetee.com
September 7, 2005
=============================


*************************ADVERTISEMENT**************************

Tektronix: Free Timing Jitter Guide

Tektronix, provider of the most complete jitter measurement 
solutions today, is offering a complimentary guide, designed to help 
you understand and characterize timing jitter. Request Your Copy 
Today: A Guide to Understanding and Characterizing Timing Jitter.

http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C23:1001CD

****************************************************************

Today's Table Of Contents:
1. Industry View
  *Power And Analog Make Successful Consumer Electronics
2. Focus On Power
  *Mini Battery Chargers Power Up Portables
3. News From The Editors
  *Tools Inch Toward Universal Applications Goal
  *DC-DC Converters Deliver Green Power
  *Online Tool Helps Evaluate Op Amps
4. Magazine Highlights: September 1, 2005
  *Cover Story: Engineering Feature -- The New Breed Of Universal Remote
  *Technology Report -- Low-Cost FPGAs: The ASIC Alternative
  *Leapfrog: First Look -- PLD Family Bridges FPGA And CPLD Needs
  *Design View/Design Solution -- 
   Migrate Your Serial Application To USB The Easy Way
5. Electronic Design Helpline
  *Variable Signal Generator

Electronic Design UPDATE edited by Lisa Maliniak, eMedia Editor
mailto:[email protected]
****************************************************************

A T-Shirt For Your Thoughts

Here's your chance to select the best design and product articles 
that appeared in the pages of Electronic Design during the past 
year. Take our short Readers' Choice online survey and get a chance 
to be one of 20 lucky participants who'll walk away with a coveted 
Electronic Design t-shirt. Look for the results in our "Best" 
special issue hitting your desk (and browser) on December 1.

http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C08:1001CD

****************************************************************

**********************
1. Industry View -- Exclusive to Electronic Design UPDATE
**********************

Power And Analog Make Successful Consumer Electronics

By Julian Hayes, Vice President of Marketing, Wolfson 
Microelectronics plc

Conventional wisdom in consumer electronics, driven by Moore's Law, 
calls for increasing functionality on single systems-on-a-chip 
(SoCs). But the laws of physics (heat, current leakage, crosstalk, etc.)
have all but eliminated Moore's Law as a gating factor for 
functional integration in consumer electronics. Modern 
microprocessors drain batteries like the engine of a Hummer drains a 
gas tank, while mixed-signal circuits stubbornly refuse to yield to 
microscopic digital design rules. Moore's Law was fine for PCs that 
crunched masses of data and forced users to adapt to unnatural user 
interfaces like monitors and keyboards. But it doesn't work when 
terabytes of data, much of it audio, are constantly flowing back and 
forth wirelessly on a handheld device. 

However, integration is still a consumer demand. So what's a digital 
designer to do? Don't worry. It's the analog designer's problem...

Read the full article at 
http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C09:1001CD  

****************************************************************

*************************ADVERTISEMENT**************************

Samtec Application Notes and Online Tools

Samtec has a full selection of application notes for SATA, XAUI, PCI 
Express, Rapid IO and other industry standards. In addition, Samtec 
offers PADS Libraries, High Speed Bandwidth Performance Selectors, 
Test Reports and Models for Simulation, and Signal Integrity support 
to create a comprehensive, user-friendly online resource for high 
speed design requirements.

http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=8FAB:1001CD

****************************************************************

**********************
2. Focus On Power
**********************

***Mini Battery Chargers Power Up Portables
Two ultra-small battery chargers are designed for 
consumer-electronics applications such as personal media devices and 
mobile phones. The SC805 and SC806 charge lithium-ion or 
lithium-polymer batteries. They come in 3- by 3-mm, thermally 
optimized Meridian lossless packing (MLP) packages. Both chargers 
produce up to 1 A when operating in continuous charge mode. During 
high-power-dissipation periods, they behave like pulse chargers that 
regulate the internal die temperature to a safe level. An 
input-voltage range of 3 to 6 V allows for seamless charging from a 
current-limited adapter. This ensures that the power dissipation for 
high-output-current designs can occur in a less sensitive wall-plug 
adapter rather than in the system's internal charging circuitry. The 
chargers are designed with three programmable charge states: a 
trickle-charge phase for deeply discharged batteries, a fast-charge 
phase, and a constant-voltage phase. Available immediately, the 
SC805 and SC806 battery chargers cost $1.05 and $1.01 each in 
10,000-piece lots.
     Semtech Corp. ==> http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=F5F7:1001CD

**********************
3. News -- From The Editors
**********************

***Tools Inch Toward Universal Applications Goal
Dissimilar mobile devices and operating systems can make designing 
software for heterogeneous networks a nightmare. But there's good 
news. The dream of creating global software applications is a little 
closer to reality with a set of tools developed by the Design 
Environments for Global Applications (DEGAS) project. The goal is 
for the tools to create one set of content and software that can be 
used on any device or operating system. Funded by the Information 
Society Technologies (IST) program, the DEGAS project initially 
defined the key elements of a software program that are common to 
all devices, such as security, and then separated out any 
device-specific functions. The project developed a theory to handle 
heterogeneous networks and produced a set of tools to write software 
for use on a broad range of devices. Specifically, the researchers 
developed a mobile adventure game and a mobile commerce solution. 
The results were so successful that project partner Motorola 
immediately began commercial deployment of the mobile e-commerce 
software, which works on a wide variety of handsets. The team used a 
standard protocol called Universal Modeling Language (UML) to design 
the key elements of the game and e-commerce software.
     Design Environments for Global Applications (DEGAS) 
     ==> http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C0A:1001CD

***DC-DC Converters Deliver Green Power
There's no need to worry about lead with the TEN-5WI series of dc-dc 
converters, which deliver 6 W of output power and fully comply with 
the RoHS Directive. The 4:1 voltage-input ranges permit operation 
from a wide array of battery and dc power systems. Fourteen models 
offer output voltages of 3.3, 5.0, 12, 15, +/-5, +/-12, and +/-15 V 
dc. They feature 1500-V I/O-isolation as well as short circuit and 
overvoltage protection. A built-in electromagnetic-interference 
filter helps the part meet emission standards without need of 
external components. Operating temperature ranges from -40 deg.C to 
85 deg.C. The converters are housed in a DIL-24 metal package with 
an industry-standard footprint. Mean time between failure (MTBF) 
ratings are more than 1 million hours, and each part comes with a 
three-year warranty. Standard pricing is as low as $19.90 in 
500-piece quantities. 
PowerGate LLC - http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C24:1001CD - provides 
sales and technical support for the North American market.
     TracoPower ==> http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C0C:1001CD

***Online Tool Helps Evaluate Op Amps
An online tool from Analog Devices eases the sometimes tedious hand 
calculations and guesswork involved in the selection and evaluation 
of op amps. By using parametric data to mathematically model 
behavior, the tool lets designers select one of the company's 
voltage feedback op amps, configure a circuit, apply a signal, and 
then evaluate the amplifier's general performance. The tool examines 
bandwidth limitations, I/O range, gain errors, and dc errors to 
ensure that the device is safely and reliably operating within its 
optimal performance range. Interactive message flags issue a series 
of warnings if a circuit configuration may lead to amplifier damage 
or if the circuit yields degraded performance. National Instruments' 
LabView software powers the op-amp evaluation tool. It's free, it's 
accessible in real time on the Analog Devices Web site, and it 
requires no software download. 
     Analog Devices ==> 
http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C25:1001CD

****************************************************************

*************************ADVERTISEMENT**************************

Electronic design can never be too innovative.

You continuously strive to empower your customers and settle for 
nothing short of excellence. With the most advanced semiconductors 
for automotive, communications and memory markets, as evidenced by 
our annual R&D investment of $1.5 billion, more than 41,000 patents, 
and $8.9 billion in revenue, we help you succeed. See how our Smart 
Chip solutions can make your next design even more innovative.

http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=A105:1001CD

****************************************************************

**********************
4. Magazine Highlights
**********************
In case you missed them, here are some of the high points of our 
most recent issue.

September 1, 2005:

* Cover Story: Engineering Feature -- The New Breed Of Universal Remote
The battle to control the flow of media in the connected home may be 
won "remotely." UEI's NevoSL wirelessly controls digital systems 
throughout the home. 
http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C0E:1001CD

* Technology Report: Low-Cost FPGAs: The ASIC Alternative
Featuring more gates and embedded memory, budget-priced FPGAs are 
getting the nod over ASICs in many volume applications.
http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C0F:1001CD

* Leapfrog: First Look -- PLD Family Bridges FPGA And CPLD Needs
These programmable-logic devices combine CPLD flash configurability 
with an FPGA lookup-table architecture for lower-cost, 
logic-intensive designs.
http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C10:1001CD

* Design View/Design Solution -- 
Migrate Your Serial Application To USB The Easy Way
By selecting a microcontroller with a native USB interface and using 
Windows CDC drivers, you can effectively emulate a legacy serial 
port. 
http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C11:1001CD

For the complete Table of Contents, go to Electronic Design ==>
http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C12:1001CD

****************************************************************

Technology in the News

Electronic Design has a new online feature: Technology in the News. 
We're going to take a closer, in-depth look at the technology issues 
that are making headlines in the mainstream media. Read our first 
offering, which explores the electronics powering the next 
generation of gaming systems.

http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C13:1001CD

****************************************************************

**********************
5. Electronic Design Helpline
**********************

***Variable Signal Generator

Electronic Design reader Andrew Frith asks:

"Does anyone know of, or how to make, a signal generator (of sorts) 
that can produce a square wave output, variable from about 100 Hz 
all the way up to 50 kHz, and be able to do so in 1- or 2-Hz jumps? 
Needs to be really stable (obvously), and should have an output of 
about 200 mA. I'll be running it from a 12-V battery. And the 
ability to switch from square to sine would be sweet too."

Do you have any tips, ideas, or resources to offer? Please e-mail 
your ideas to Lisa Maliniak mailto:[email protected] for posting 
on the Electronic Design Web site.

Readers seeking help with design problems, looking for parts, or in 
need of advice on tips and techniques are encouraged to e-mail us at 
mailto:[email protected] for posting in future editions of the ED 
Update newsletter.

****************************************************************

Embedded in Electronic Design (EiED) Online is your source for 
technical insight and hands-on reviews. Read one of Technology 
Editor Bill Wong's latest EiED Online columns, "An Eye On NI Week." 
Bill attended NI Week, National Instruments' annual dog and pony 
show. He takes a look at the best of breed, including some 
integrated solutions that streamline the development process along 
with Lego robot competitors.
http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=12C14:1001CD

**********************

TAKE A POLL!

Which project should take top priority in NASA's future plans?

-- International space station
-- Manned flights to the moon
-- Manned flight to Mars
-- Unmanned space exploration
-- None of the above

Vote at Electronic Design ==> http://www.elecdesign.com

****************************************************************

Enter Our Photo Contest! 

Grab some photos showing the "guts and glory" of you (and your team) 
at work. We need them for our "Day in the Life of an Electronic 
Designer" photo essay, which will appear in Electronic Design's Oct. 
20 special issue. There's a $500 Grand Prize for best photo series 
and $250 prize for best photo, and we pay $50 if we use any of your 
photos in the issue. Please include the names and titles of all 
photo subjects, as well as company name and the type of 
work-in-process illustrated by the photo. Digital photos should be 
in .tif or .jpg formats and must have resolution of at least 
300 dpi. Deadline for submission is Sept. 15.

E-mail digital photos to Richard Gawel at mailto:[email protected]

Mail hard-copy photos to:
 
Richard Gawel
Electronic Design
Managing Editor
45 Eisenhower Dr., 5th Floor
Paramus, NJ 07652 

****************************************************************

SUBSCRIBE ONLINE TO ELECTRONIC DESIGN
If you're reading this e-newsletter, then you are either a current 
Electronic Design subscriber, or should be (145,000 of your peers 
are). To apply for or renew a subscription to Electronic Design 
absolutely FREE and without paperwork or hassle, click on the link 
below.

http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=2B24:1001CD
****************************************************************

==================================

CONTACTS: Electronic Design UPDATE e-NEWSLETTER
==================================

Editorial: Mark David, Editor-in-Chief
mailto:[email protected]

Advertising/Sponsorship Opportunities: Bill Baumann, Publisher:
mailto:[email protected]
=======================================

You've received this e-newsletter for one of two reasons:
1) You subscribe to Electronic Design magazine
2) You've signed up for it at:
http://www.planetee.com/Index.cfm?Action=Email

Please see below for unsubscribe and address-change instructions.

To unsubscribe click here 
http://nls.planetee.com/u?id=DAC10E05C26BA8722E8FACB3586CE6F0

To change your email address send an email, include your old address 
as well as your new one, to:
mailto:[email protected]

To subscribe visit our e-newsletter subscription center at 
http://www.planetee.com/Index.cfm?Action=Email

If you need assistance in updating the information you have provided 
to Penton or you have questions or comments about our privacy 
policies, please click on the link below.
http://nls.planetee.com/t?ctl=1254E:1001CD

Copyrighted 2005 Penton Media, Inc. All rights reserved.

Electronic Design
45 Eisenhower Dr., 5th Floor
Paramus, NJ 07652 
USA