EEs Talk Tech

Kenny shares his experience debugging 800 MHz EMC issues at an unnamed engineering site. The culprit? A power supply! Sometimes, that 1:1 probe just isn’t enough… Daniel Bogdanoff and guest host Erin chat with Kenny Johnson about the impact of power supplies on conducted and radiated emissions. https://eestalktech.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Power-Supply-EMI-and-Bandwidth-Woes-31-1.mp3 Video: Links to discussed topics: Decoupling Capacitor Optimization for Power Integrity Webcast: https://www.keysight.com/main/eventDetail.jspx?cc=US&lc=eng&ckey=2908999&nid=-35724.0.08 Slides: Click to access 29March2018WebcastSlides.pdf How to Design for Power Integrity Video Series: Slides: Click to access 5_Power_Integrity_Ecosystem.pdf Kenny’s Favorite Probe https://www.keysight.com/en/pd-1938466/high-voltage-probe-10001-30-kv-50-mhz?cc=US&lc=eng Agenda: 00:00 Kenny likes textbooks 1:30 Kenny is a power integrity expert 2:00 Mobile device design is hard, Kenny feels bad for designers 2:15 Power integrity is coupled in with their radio, and makes it hard to pass EMI and EMC 3:20 EMI/EMC is failing, but: Hardware guy has good data Software guy has good software Power guy looks to have no issues 4:45 FCC, ETSI 5:00 Types of EMI and EMC are: Conducted emissions Radiated emissions 6:00 Example: The IoT processor is only clocking at 5 MHz, but the EMC engineer is picking up noise up to 750-800 MHz. And, the system is dropping bits. 7:15 The 1:1 passive probe was hiding the higher frequency noise. Then, they were able to trigger on the power supply and see the noise in the data line – power supply induced jitter. A common rule of thumb is to have 20 MHz of bandwidth, but that’s not always enough! 10:50 Optimizing decoupling capacitors. How to choose the right capacitors? Where to place decoupling capacitors? 11:50 Many complex components come with design guidelines (voltage regulators, capacitors, etc.). But, it shouldn’t be treated as law. 13:00 Helpful resources 13:40 If you’re working on more prosaic devices (they aren’t crazy fast), even if you aren’t having an EMI issue, the same part of the board that’s having the EMI issues can also pollute the antennas. 14:30 How much bandwidth should you get? 15:25 Kenny connects to his device at full bandwidth, then pulls up an FFT. Then, he bandwidth limits to where the FFT rolls off. 16:15 A new power rail probe goes out to 6 GHz. Why do we need this much bandwidth? Higher BW noise! 18:00 Kenny saw a startup hub in Boston. It had a lot of different startups that pooled their collective resources to get access to higher end test equipment. 19:00 Kenny feels like the free tools are good for qualitative measurements, but not for quantitative measurements. 20:46 – Adam Savage – “Buy the cheapest tool first. If you break it, go buy a nice one.” 21:30 Kenny is part of the inspiration for this podcast. 24:45 Stupid Questions: What’s the worst possible power integrity advice you could possibly give to someone? What’s your favorite probe and why?  

It seems most large labs have a go-to data person. You know, the one who had to upgrade his PC so it could handle insanely complex Excel pivot tables? In large electrical engineering R&D labs, measurement data can often be inaccessible and unreliable. In today’s electrical engineering podcast, Daniel Bogdanoff (@Keysight_Daniel) sits down with Ailee Grumbine and Brad Doerr to talk about techniques for managing test & measurement data for large engineering projects. https://eestalktech.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/data-analytics-for-engineering-projects-23-ees-talk-tech-electrical-engineering-podcast.mp3 Agenda: 1:10 – Who is using data analytics? 2:00 – for a hobbyist in the garage, they may still have a lot of data. But, because it’s a one-person team, it’s much easier to handle the data. Medium and large size teams generate a lot of data. There are a lot of prototypes, tests, etc. 3:25 – The best teams manage their data efficiently. They are able to make quick, informed decisions. 4:25 – A manager told Brad, “I would rather re-make the measurements because I don’t trust the data that we have.” 6:00 – Separate the properties from the measurements. Separate the data from the metadata. Separating data from production lines, prototype units, etc. helps us at Keysight make good engineering decisions. 9:30 – Data analytics helps for analyzing simulation data before tape out of a chip. 10:30 – It’s common to have multiple IT people managing a specific project. 11:00 – Engineering companies should use a data analytics tool that is data and domain agnostic. 11:45 – Many teams have an engineer or two that manage data for their teams. Often, it’s the team lead. They often get buried in data analytics instead of engineering and analysis work. It’s a bad investment to have engineers doing IT work. 14:00 – A lot of high speed serial standards have workshops and plugfests. They test their products to make sure they are interoperable and how they stack up against their competitors. 15:30 – We plan to capture industry-wide data and let people see how their project stacks up against the industry as a whole. 16:45 – On the design side, it’s important to see how the design team’s simulation results stack up against the validation team’s empirical results. 18:00 – Data analytics is crucial for manufacturing. About 10% of our R&D tests make it to manufacturing. And, manufacturing has a different set of data and metrics. 19:00 – Do people get hired/fired based on data? In one situation, there was a lack of data being shared that ended up costing the company over $1M and 6 months of time-to-market.

Wide bandgap semiconductors, like Gallium Nitride (GaN) and Silicon Carbide (SiC) are shaping the future of power electronics by boosting power efficiency and reducing physical footprint. Server farms, alternative energy sources, and electrical grids will all be affected! Mike Hoffman and Daniel Bogdanoff sit down with Kenny Johnson to discuss in today’s electrical engineering podcast. https://eestalktech.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/wide-bandgap-semiconductos-for-power-electronics-ees-talk-tech-electrical-engineering-podcast-20.mp3 Links: Fact Sheet: https://energy.gov/eere/articles/infographic-wide-bandgap-semiconductors Fact Sheet Click to access wide_bandgap_semiconductors_factsheet.pdf Tech Assessment (Good timeline information) Click to access QTR%20Ch8%20-%20Wide%20Bandgap%20TA%20Feb-13-2015.pdf Agenda – Wide Bandgap Semiconductors Use in Power Electronics 3:00 What is a wide bandgap semiconductor? GaN (Gallium Nitride) devices and SiC (Silicon Carbide) can switch on and off much faster than typical silicon power devices. Wide bandgap semiconductors also have better thermal conductivity. And, wide bandgap semiconductors have a significantly lower drain-source resistance (R-on). For switch mode power supplies, the transistor switch time is the key source of inefficiency. So, switching faster makes things more efficient. 4:00 They will also reduce the size of power electronics. 6:30 Wide bandgap semiconductors have a very fast rise time, which can cause EMI and RFI problems. The high switching speed also means they can’t handle much parasitic inductance. So, today’s IC packaging technology isn’t ideal. 8:30 Wide bandgap semiconductors are enabling the smart grid. The smart grid essentially means that you only turning on things being used, and turning off power completely when they aren’t being used. 9:35 Wide bandgap semiconductors will probably be integrated into server farms before they are used in power grid distribution or in homes. 10:20 Google uses a lot of power. 2.3 TWh (terawatt hour) NYT article: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/09/technology/google-details-and-defends-its-use-of-electricity.html It’s estimated Google has 900,000 servers, and that accounts for maybe 1% of the world’s servers. So, they are willing to put in the investment to work out the details of this technology. 11:50 The US Department of Energy wants people to get an advanced degree in power electronics. Countries want to have technology leadership in this area. 13:00 Wide bandgap semiconductors are also very important for wind farms and other alternative forms of energy. Having a solid switch mode power supply means that you don’t have to have extra capacity. USA Dept of Energy: If industrial motor systems were wide bandgap semiconductors took over, it would save a ton of energy. 14:45 A huge percentage of the world’s power is consumed by electrical pumps. 16:20 Kenny’s oldest son works for a company that goes around and shows companies how to recover energy costs. There aren’t many tools available for measuring wide bandgap semiconductor power electronics. 19:30 Utilities and servers are the two main industries that will initially adopt wide band gap semiconductors 20:35 When will this technology get implemented in the real world? There are parts available today, but it probably won’t be viable for roughly 2-5 years. 21:00 Devices with fast switching are beneficial, but have their own set of problems. The faster a devices switches, the more EMI and RFI you have to deal with. Spread spectrum clocking is a technique used to pass EMI compliance. 24:00 Band gaps of different materials: Diamond 5.5 eV Gallium Nitride (GaN) 3.4 eV Silicon Carbide (SiC) 3.3 eV

Daniel Bogdanoff and Mike Hoffman sit down with Brig Asay to talk about how to price a hardware project. Listen in as they discuss the complexities of pricing a new hardware product in a global economy. Follow Brig Asay on Yelp @baasay. Video Version (YouTube): Audio Only: https://eestalktech.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/how-to-price-your-hardware-project-ees-talk-tech-electrical-engineering-podcast.mp3 0:00 Intro How should you price hardware? 1:45 Tell us in the comments what you think our green screen should be! 2:00 Economics 101: Supply & Demand This is how we generally set prices for hardware 2:40 Top down pricing takes into account your cost of manufacturing. But if you price based on production costs, you’re going to fail in your pricing. It’s all about what consumers are willing to pay. 4:00 Pharmaceutical companies are the example of bad pricing schemes. They justify high prices based on high R&D costs. But the reality is that consumers don’t care about R&D costs. They care about how bad they need the product, and this will determine how much they are willing to pay. 4:30 Someone on EEVblog hacked a 3000T, reverse engineering it to make it a 1 GHz scope. 5:30 The newer the idea, the harder it is to price because there’s no real market value. Talking to potential customers is a good way to start pricing in white space. 6:45 Marketing 101: Who are your customers? Determining who you are trying to sell to and talking with them can help with pricing. Competitor pricing is a good baseline, but then you often get into value-based pricing. 7:50 Spreadsheets are the killer of pricing. They compete with your gut feeling. $10K per GHz of bandwidth is a standard in oscilloscope pricing, but it doesn’t always apply. When we came out with the Infiniium Z-Series, a 63 GHz scope, we knew the market couldn’t support a $630K price. 9:00 Price/volume curve = Supply and demand chart 10:50 Different regions have different pricing expectations. Currency, cultural expectations, and import taxes all come into play when considering regional pricing. Should a small company even worry about regional pricing? 16:40 You need to be willing to adjust pricing. Dynamics of the market and the value of your product can change over time. If you’re not selling anything, you need to adjust your price. Priced too low and people may have the perception that you’re selling a low-quality product. 19:20 Pricing too low may also inadvertently shrink your market size. Overly undercutting your competitor may hurt you in the long-run. 23:15 Does the psychological side to pricing always apply? What’s the stigma around prices ending in a 9 or 8? 25:00 Stupid Questions with Mike: What is your favorite price and why? What is your favorite currency and why? 27:40 Tell us about your software or hardware project in the comments!

How do we handle the ethical dilemmas that arise when building increasingly capable and intelligent systems? AI is all around us- likely a part of your phone, home systems, and even cars. Autonomous cars offer greater convenience, safety, and efficiency, but is the world ready to tackle the corresponding ethical dilemmas? https://eestalktech.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/ai-ethics-and-autonomous-cars.mp3 Video (YouTube): Follow Brig Asay on Yelp @baasay. Discussion Overview: AI Ethics Restaurant Reviews by AI 01:41 Self-driving (autonomous) cars AI ethical dilemma and AI decision liability What about consumer liability? AI decision-making without human interaction 07:25 The three stages of AI Artificial Narrow Intelligence (ANI also known as “weak AI”), Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI)  07:48 AI consciousness, AI ethical standards, and self-replicating AI Humanoid robots Should AI be allowed to replicate itself? 10:16 Task-based AI using computers Is there a need to program AI to have morals and ethics? The prisoner’s dilemma and game theory Challenges of marketing self-driving cars Autonomous buses emulating human behavior Should AI have to follow local laws and regulations? 17:50 Telemetry tracking autonomous vehicles for speed monitoring Self-programmable FPGAs and neural network simulations Can a computer be evil? 26:30 EEs Talk Tech Electrical Engineering podcast