Re: Most interesting recent products / improvements?

On Sat, 29 Aug 2009 16:52:02 -0700, Joerg <invalid@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

krw wrote:
On Sat, 29 Aug 2009 15:48:21 -0700, Joerg <invalid@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

krw wrote:
On Fri, 28 Aug 2009 06:39:12 -0700, Joerg <invalid@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

krw wrote:

[...]

I just got a quote from Actel for $2.90 for a 750ish LUT/FF, 77 user
I/O, flash-based FPGA.

If I'd put a $2.90 part on a design without a serious reason such as
"the world would stop spinning if we didn't", many of my client would
have my head examined :-)
Even if it replaced six parts worth $12?

I can't remember the last time where six digital parts would have cost
$12 in any of my designs. More like 10c times six :-)

[...]

No wonder you don't think digital stuff is fun. You're too cheap to
buy interesting parts. ...


I do occasionally get involved with uC but it's not much fun for me.
Usually I leave that to teh experts, just like DSP.

UCs are all the same anymore. We have another group of engineers to
screw them up. ;-)

... Other than passives and transistors, there is
not much we buy that costs less than a buck.


The you may be leaving money on the table :-)

My time is worth money too, as is another board spin.

Lots of transistors and fets that cost 3 cents
Free resistors.

Free?

Less than the cost of putting them there.

I guess you assume domestic production.
We do our own.

Yep, that gets expensive.

It's sometimes necessary. Our main business is so cyclical that we
need the control in-house manufacturing gives. Certainly control over
production trumps cost.

Maybe you are better off in Alabama than we are in California.

In more ways than one. ;-)


Yeah, maybe some day we'll join you.

It's a pretty place (no mountains or snow, though) but rather quiet.
This is a fairly big "small town". If I moved it would likely be
100NE to Atlanta. Atlanta is a *really* big small town. ;-)

That's expensive, even worse in
Europe. But in China, very different thing. Many folks don't know, there
was even one guy here in the NG who just refused to believe that 5%
resistors would make sense anymore. They do, seriously.
They don't for us - inventory. A reel of 5,000 1% resistors is less
than $10 from DigiKey, of all places.

We sometimes calculate them in millicents :-)

Our product markups are better than what Larkin claims (and our
quantities higher), so millicents aren't the main issue. I just
started a cost reduction design pass on our products but I'm certainly
not looking at millicents. Our fixed costs drown that out. Molds are
*expensive*.


In the end it boils down to whether the lower cost is or was worth the NRE.

Yep. There were some decisions made that are going to be hard to
counter. The real savings (like 2x $15 for pots) are going to break
the mold.

Gallium Nitride and Silicon Carbide and SiGe

Tiny Logic

Super-precision delta-sigma ADCs
But no DACs to match. :-(

Too many voltage regulators
Boy howdy!
But nearly all LDOs and thus off limits in this here lab,
Doesn't matter what they are, there are too many. Lets see, our base
unit has 1.2V, 1.5V, 1.8V (times two), 3.3V (times two), 5.6V, 5V
(times three), +12V (times two), -12V, +19V, and various references
(and I'm sure I've forgotten at least one). That's something like 15
supplies totaling 12W.

And if you don't sequence them meticulously a $100 FPGA blows its lid?
Not so much anymore. Actel (and ALtera, IIRC) parts are guaranteed to
not need sequencing. Actel even supports hot plugging.

Oh man, I am glad I am an analog dude :-)
No FPGAs in the above. The analog circuits take about half of the
above supplies.

Maybe someone should have a chat with the analog guys ;-)

Start with TI's. ;-)


Don't use the fancy parts :-)

Don't use TI.

... I'd even add a couple more to get rid of the
single-ended analog. We also have isolation requirements so some
supplies show up on both sides of the barrier. They are paranoid
about running the analogs and digital stuff from the same supplies
(and grounds!) too. ...even though neither are being taxed.


I am usually pretty brazen in that respect. Single-supply analog as much
as possible, I normally don't object sharing the supplies with the
digital guys as long as they share their Christmas cookies, and iso
supplies are home made using little transformers and some sort of bridge
driver (as long as not over a buck ...).

I don't like throwing away the "free" PSRR. I'm planning on combining
supplies to save space more than the cost of the components.
Interboard connectors are expensive and a PITA. The isos we're using
are bricks (=expensive).
.

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