Electronic Design UPDATE: March 10, 2004

March 10, 2004
Editor's View -- Rethinking Power-Supply Efficiency by Sam Davis, Contributing Editor. The APEC 2004 power-supply design competition intends to showcase highly efficient technology and foster the market conditions necessary for those technologies to...
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Electronic Design UPDATE e-Newsletter Electronic Design Magazine PlanetEE ==> www.planetee.com March 10, 2004

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*************************ADVERTISEMENT************************** Introducing MAX II: The Lowest-Cost CPLD Ever Building on more than a decade of CPLD leadership and innovation, Altera introduces MAX II devices. Featuring a groundbreaking new architecture, MAX II CPLDs deliver all the ease-of-use benefits of industry-leading MAX devices at half the cost and one-tenth the power consumption. Meet Altera's new MAX II family! http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCd0AV **************************************************************** Today's Table Of Contents: 1. Editor's View * Rethinking Power-Supply Efficiency 2. Focus On Analog * Small ADC Features Big Performance 3. News From The Editors * Tiny Removable Memory Modules Target Mobile Systems * Software Analyzes 10-Gbit/s Waveforms * Broad-Based Design Tool Is Platform-Independent * Demand For Power MOSFETs Growing 4. Upcoming Industry Events * Embedded Systems Conference * 3D Architectures for Semiconductor Integration and Packaging * International Symposium on Physical Design * Semicon Europa, including MEMS Manufacturing and Packaging Forum 5. Magazine Highlights: March 1, 2004 * Cover Story: Technology Report -- Controller ICs Energize Power-Supply Design * Leapfrog: First Look -- Mobile Jukebox Engine Jazzes Up Digital Audio, JPEGs * Leapfrog: First Look -- I/O Bus Bridges The Chasm Between CAN And Ethernet * Design View / Design Solution -- Build Complex ASICs Without ASIC Design Expertise, Expensive Tools Electronic Design UPDATE edited by John Novellino **************************************************************** BE SURE TO VISIT Electronic Design's Web site, where the power of Electronic Design is a mouse click away! Read our Web exclusives, enjoy our Quick Poll, discover Featured Vendors, access our archives, share viewpoints in our Forums, explore our e-newsletters, and more. Go to: http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ05Am0AE TAKE OUR CURRENT QUICK POLL: Do you agree with this issue's Editorial, "Protect American Jobs By Winning At Global R&D"? Post your comments at http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCQ0AC Go to Electronic Design ==> http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ03Hf0AC ***** Can't get to the Embedded Systems Conference? Bring the ESC show to your desktop via Electronic Design's Inside Embedded webcast. Embedded Technical Editor Bill Wong gives you the ESC lowdown, direct from the show: PCI Express Arrives On Time Serial ATA Drives For Serious Systems A Plethora Of Wireless Products Switch To Which Fabric? Eclipse Shines Through For Developers Standards Drive Board Products Sign up to join the FREE webcast. Hear the hot market trends and see the showstopping new products direct from the Embedded Systems Conference on April 1 (no fooling!) at 12:00 noon EST. Go to: http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BFpF0Aj ***** Attend the PowerDesign365 "Why Factorized Power Architecture?" webcast on March 25 at 12:00 noon EST. New distributed power technology has raised interest and questions in the industry. What are the real benefits of this new system? Will OEMs take a risk on the new technology? This will be the first open forum for a discussion on this topic. Only PowerDesign365 registrants will be able to attend this webcast. To join now, go to http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BFSC0AD ***** 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://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BEE30Ag **************************************************************** ********************** 1. Editor's View -- Exclusive to Electronic Design UPDATE ********************** Rethinking Power-Supply Efficiency By Sam Davis, Contributing Editor The APEC 2004 power-supply design competition intends to showcase highly efficient technology and foster the market conditions necessary for those technologies to succeed in the marketplace. The focus of the competition is on ac-dc power supplies for consumer and industrial applications. The competition was launched at the recent Applied Power Electronics Conference and Exposition (APEC 2004) in Anaheim, Calif. The basis for the competition was research by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Energy Star program and the California Energy Commission's Public Interest Energy Research (PIER) program. The agencies identified ac-dc power supplies as a major opportunity for reducing global energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, with more than 3 billion units in use in the U.S. and about 10 billion units in use globally. Unfortunately, this focus on ac-dc power supplies is not the complete answer. A better approach to energy efficiency would be more systems-oriented. With the IC industry moving toward lower voltages and higher currents, distributed power architectures are employed in many computer-based systems. As a result, dc-dc power supplies and point-of-load converters are found in many industrial systems. Desktop converters even employ a voltage-regulation module (VRM) for distributed power. A point to remember is that the efficiency of series-connected power supplies is the product of the individual efficiencies. For example, if the ac-dc supply is 95% efficient and it is followed by two 90% efficient dc-dc converters, the overall efficiency is (0.95)(0.9)(0.9) = 0.77, or 77%. Furthermore, virtually all U.S. power-supply industry attendees at APEC are probably involved with the design of industrial systems, not consumer equipment. Therefore, improvement of an APEC attendee's ac-dc supply efficiency would be directed toward industrial supplies where distributed power lowers overall efficiency. Also, many industrial ac-dc supplies employ power factor correction, which improves overall efficiency, but supplies for low-power consumer applications rarely use this technique. That doesn't mean that the APEC design competition, which runs through the end of the year, isn't a worthwhile effort. But the design competition is just the first step. Much more work has to be done to improve the power-management efficiency of electronic systems. If you're interested in more information about the competition, go to http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCe0AW Meanwhile, for more information about APEC 2004, including product announcements, go to http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCf0AX To comment on this Editor's View, go to Reader Comments at the foot of the Web page: Electronic Design UPDATE ==> http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCS0AE ********************** 2. Focus On Analog ********************** ***Small ADC Features Big Performance A 14-bit, 2.8-Msample/s serial analog-to-digital converter, the LTC1403, comes in a 10-pin MSOP package targeting compact data-acquisition designs. The device delivers ac and dc performance of 73.5 dB SINAD and +/-4-LSB integral nonlinearity. The LTC1403 draws only 5 mA when sampling at 4 Msamples/s with a 3-V supply. Power dissipation is 3.3 mW in the nap mode, with the on-board 2.5-V reference remaining, and 6 microW with everything powered down in the sleep mode. Common-mode input rejection is 80 dB. The device has an easy-to-use microcontroller- and DSP-compatible three-wire serial peripheral interface. It also has a 0- to 5-V unipolar input range. The LTC1403 is available in commercial and industrial temperature ranges. Prices begin at $4.00 each in 1000-piece quantities. Linear Technology Corp. ==> http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCT0AF ********************** 3. News -- From The Editors ********************** ***Tiny Removable Memory Modules Target Mobile Systems The T-Flash memory module is staking its claim as the world's smallest removable flash memory format. It is similar in size and function to embedded flash memory, but it can be readily removed and upgraded to enable systems to offer a range of memory capacities. The module's exceptionally small size, 11 by 15 by 1 mm, is about one-quarter the volume of the smallest removable flash cards on the market today. This will let handset manufacturers incorporate significant amounts of removable storage capacity into progressively smaller handsets. To realize the small form factor, SanDisk uses advanced packaging technology and its proven NAND multilevel cell flash memory and controller technologies. Until systems include the T-Flash sockets, an SD-card adapter can be used to hold T-Flash modules. Samples of the T-Flash are available now, with production expected to commence in the second quarter. Prices range from $14 to $39 for capacities of 32 to 128 Mbytes. SanDisk Corp. ==> http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCU0AG ***Software Analyzes 10-Gbit/s Waveforms Designed for use with equivalent-time sampling oscilloscopes, Gigaview SA software delivers compliance measurements and diagnostic information for waveform analysis at and above 10 Gbits/s. The result is better characterization and prediction of long-term high-speed device performance. The software accurately and repeatably quantifies random and deterministic jitter, random and deterministic noise, data-dependent jitter, total jitter, and total noise measurements to a bit-error rate (BER) of 10exp-15. Gigaview SA implements a patented and industry-accepted jitter separation methodology that's the reference standard for Fibre Channel, Serial ATA, PCI Express, Gigabit Ethernet, InfiniBand, and XAUI, among others. This significantly expands the oscilloscope's compliance and diagnostic capabilities, ensuring interoperability and improving time-to-market. The platform-independent software currently runs on both the Agilent 86100 and the Tektronix CSA and TDS 8000 sampling oscilloscopes. Gigaview SA software is available now for $14,995. Wavecrest Corp. ==> http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCV0AH ***Broad-Based Design Tool Is Platform-Independent The second generation of VisualSim offers a platform-independent graphical and textual modeling tool that supports digital and analog design, embedded software, imaging, control systems, and DSP design. With VisualSim 2.0's virtual prototyping, design teams can explore architectural alternatives early in the game. A Virtual Resources library simplifies model creation, boosts simulation performance, and improves model functionality. Library blocks can be used to define processors, memory, bus routing, real-time operating systems, and much more. Mirabilis Design ==> http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCW0AI ***Demand For Power MOSFETs Growing The worldwide market for power MOSFET drivers will grow to $411.3 million by 2006, a compound annual growth rate of 8.8%, according to Venture Development Corp. The technology market research firm says that OEMs in the consumer market are demanding smaller, less power-hungry MOSFETs for use in cell phones, PDAs, portable music players, GPS receivers, and other devices. The company's research indicates that 45.0% of respondents in the overall market intend to increase their use of MOSFETs. In the consumer product arena, that figure jumps to 75.8%. OEMs feel that power-management MOSFETs meet the needs of mobile applications because of their ability to be driven from a 2.5-V supply in very small footprints, their high switching speeds, and their typically low-resistance speeds. More information can be found in the report, "The Global Market for Power Supply and Power Management Integrated Circuits, Fourth Edition." Venture Development Corp. ==> http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BFpK0Ao ********************** 4. Upcoming Industry Events ********************** March 29-April 1, Embedded Systems Conference San Francisco, Calif. http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCX0AJ Apr. 13-15, 3D Architectures for Semiconductor Integration and Packaging San Francisco, Calif. http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCY0AK Apr. 18-21, International Symposium on Physical Design (ISPD) Phoenix, Ariz. http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BFpM0Aq Apr. 20-22, Semicon Europa, including MEMS Manufacturing and Packaging Forum Munich, Germany http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCZ0AL ********************** 5. Magazine Highlights ********************** In case you missed them, here are some of the high points of our most recent issue. March 1, 2004: * Cover Story: Technology Report -- Controller ICs Energize Power-Supply Design New "do-it-yourself" controller and drive ICs give systems builders options to tackle the difficult task of providing power supplies for today's demanding equipment. * Leapfrog: First Look -- Mobile Jukebox Engine Jazzes Up Digital Audio, JPEGs One chip encodes/decodes digital audio files as well as decodes JPEGs for a total entertainment experience. * Leapfrog: First Look -- I/O Bus Bridges The Chasm Between CAN And Ethernet Racing along at 48 Mbits/s, the Ultiwire I/O bus uses a proprietary protocol that may become the standard. * Design View / Design Solution -- Build Complex ASICs Without ASIC Design Expertise, Expensive Tools For the complete Table of Contents, go to Electronic Design ==> http://lists.planetee.com/cgi-bin3/DM/y/eewl0DJhUf0EmQ0BGCa0AS

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CONTACTS: Electronic Design UPDATE e-NEWSLETTER

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Editorial: Lucinda Mattera, Associate Chief Editor: mailto:[email protected] Advertising/Sponsorship Opportunities: Bill Baumann, Associate Publisher: mailto:[email protected]

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