PowerSource
Technical Editor Margery Conner's PowerSource streams the latest developments in electronic power design and related technologies. Follow Margery on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/margeryc.
Adafruit, Sparkfun point to the democratization of hardware
One of the not-so-obvious side benefits of the miniaturization of electronics is that folks far removed from the realm of electronic engineering become comfortable with small electronic devices and think, “Wouldn’t it be neat if I had a [gizmo] that did…?” Back when computers were called “workstations” their inner workings seemed mysterious, complex, and e ...... Read More
Comments (0)Dinner with Brad Davis, Best in Test's “Test Engineer of the Year”
Last night, after Brad Davis of Broadcom won the DesignCon Best it Test “Test Engineer of the Year” award, I got to tag along when the folks at Test & Measurement World and National Instruments (whose equipment Brad uses in some of his setups) took him out for a celebratory dinner. Brad’s test group is charged with developing the test hardware and software – i ...... Read More
Comments (1)L-Prize bulb price specs use the Captain Barbossa method: They’re more like guidelines
I really have only myself to blame for not carefully reading the text around the pricing table contained in the L-Prize requirements for the sales price of the L-Prize bulb. See, I thought that the L-Prize competition’s “target retail prices,” listed in the table below, were targets in the sense that you were supposed to hit them. Apparently not. Philips, the competition ...... Read More
Comments (13)Paper looks at capacitance in power planes for high-speed signaling
Since its inception, DesignCon has been the pre-eminent conference for signal integrity and EMI issues. This year is no exception: I’m going to try to attend a paper with the intriguing title, ”Are power planes necessary for high-speed signaling?” on the morning of Thursday, Feb. 2. From the paper abstract it looks like the authors will cover new techniques to juggle capacitan ...... Read More
Comments (2)Lighting Sciences Group becomes largest producer of LED bulbs in North America
I first heard of Lighting Sciences Group (LSG) back in 2007 as being the company that designed and built the LED replacement for the Times Square ball that drops on New Years Eve; I thought it was strictly an engineering design firm. And then its LED light bulbs started showing up in Home Depot stores. Last year at the Google I/O conference, LSG was the first company Google teamed up with for a An ...... Read More
Comments (17)California passes new regulations for battery charging systems
A couple of weeks ago the California Energy Commission (CEC) released a new standard for personal electronics equipment sold in California that targets energy efficiency in battery charging systems (BCSs). In addition, if the BCS uses an external power supply (EPS) — which includes wall warts, for example — the new regulation covers the EPS efficiency also. The CEC’s BCS ...... Read More
Comments (41)Thrun says goodbye to Stanford (and my robocar); Hello to a world university
It seems that Sebastian Thrun, Google Fellow and research professor at Stanford University, has decided to quit Stanford, giving up his tenure, to start a new online university called Udacity. His goal is to enroll 500,000 students for his first course – which will be free — on how to build a search engine. Thrun is the key player in Google’s autonomous car project, which see ...... Read More
Comments (35)LED system reliability is a strong as the weakest link: February live presentation
Just before I posted my busted LED light yesterday, I received an email from Azmat Malik asking if I could help get the word out about a presentation by Rudi Hechfellner, Dir. of Applications, Philips Lumileds Lighting, “”Reliability from the LED System Perspective — As Strong as the Weakest Link“. The presentation will be at a meeting of the Santa Clara Valley ch ...... Read More
Comments (2)Qualcomm offers $10M for a real-life tricorder, not a moment too soon
I saw on EDA360 Insider that Qualcomm is offering a $10M prize for the first non-invasive health diagnostic tool, to be called the Qualcomm Tricorder X-Prize. For those of you who are rusty on your Star Trek plot lines, the tricorder is the piece of equipment that would take a quick scan of an injured or sick human (non-human, too? I don’t remember) and instantly diagnose both the problem a ...... Read More
Comments (17)Here’s one LED light that didn’t make it to 50,000-hrs
Almost two years ago I did my first LED teardown on a 7W LED bulb from Taiwanese manufacturer TESS. They sent me two bulbs, one in warm white and one cool. I tore down the cool white, and afterwards re-purposed it so that, minus its protective plastic dome, it lives behind a light fixture on the ceiling of the laundry room and still works. However, its warm white brother went to work in a table l ...... Read More
Comments (71)Osram in pilot production with GaN-on-silicon high-power LEDs
High-brightness LED prices have been dropping sharply even as their lumens/Watt has been increasing. Here’s a technology development that should serve to drive prices even lower, albeit we won’t see the results for at least two years: Osram has announced that it’s in the pilot stage of producing high-performance blue LEDs grown in gallium-nitride layers on 6-in. silicon ...... Read More
Comments (1)Eltek calls out Chinese vendor for IP theft in Chinese courts
How to protect their IP from Chinese companies is a significant problem for some non-Asian electronics companies. I have talked with some US companies that have come to tacit agreements with Chinese companies: The Chinese companies can do what they like within China while selling to their Chinese customers, but any attempt to export to internationally will bring down a lawsuit. The rationale for t ...... Read More
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