New Semis Help Designers Turn on the Power
By Randy Frank, contributing editor When automakers add more electronic features to differentiate their vehicles, they have to consider the impact on the vehicle’s power supply. Some new systems, such as stop-start systems and regenerative braking are being added to improve fuel economy and reduce emissions. To simplify the power management task in all systems, suppliers continue to introduce more efficient products and use techniques that reduce power consumption. More area efficient, dual-sided cooling packages for power MOSFETs, the use switching technology in Class D audio amplifiers and LED headlights are examples of industry efforts to use less power...
Software Tools: Automakers Continue to Push Suppliers for More
By Randy Frank Contributing Editor Coordinating the increasing network of software and hardware modules in today's vehicles requires forming a system model to account for all the interfaces...
SerDes Test Strategies to Minimize EMI/EMC
Tanja Hofner, Maxim Integrated Products Inc. In automotive applications, testing for electromagnetic interference (EMI) and electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) is an important part of design verification for serializer/deserializer (SerDes) devices. EMI and EMC must be considered early in the design cycle to prevent needless revisions. This article offers basic concepts and guidelines on preparing a SerDes system for EMI/EMC testing....
New Semis Help Designers Turn on the Power
By Randy Frank, contributing editor When automakers add more electronic features to differentiate their vehicles, they have to consider the impact on the vehicle’s power supply. Some new systems, such as stop-start systems and regenerative braking are being added to improve fuel economy and reduce emissions. To simplify the power management task in all systems, suppliers continue to introduce more efficient products and use techniques that reduce power consumption. More area efficient, dual-sided cooling packages for power MOSFETs, the use switching technology in Class D audio amplifiers and LED headlights are examples of industry efforts to use less power...
Design Challenges for Digital Instrument Clusters
By Andy Gryc, QNX Software Systems Digital instrument clusters are poised to supersede analog clusters in next-generation vehicles. This may seem surprising at first, since digital clusters require higher-end CPUs and much more software than their analog counterparts, not to mention large LCD panels. Why, then, are automakers adopting them? ...
