Seminars
Seminars are located at Itasca Country Club, 400 E. Orchard Street, Itasca, IL.
| Track I 8:30AM- 9:45AM |
Track II 9:50AM- 11:05AM |
Track III 11:10AM- 12:25PM |
Lunch 12:25PM- 1:25PM |
Track IV 1:30PM- 2:45PM |
Track V 2:55PM- 4:05PM |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Analog Devices | Texas Instruments | EPCOS | Littelfuse | Atmel | |
| Honeywell | Freescale | Phoenix Contact | Fairchild | Altera | |
| Renesas | NXP Semiconductors |
Cypress | Freescale | ||
| Arrow Lighting | Intel | Linear Technology | Texas Instruments | Numonyx | |
| National Semiconductor | ON Semiconductor |
8:30 AM - 9:45 AM Seminars Track I
- Analog Devices - Fractional-N Synthesizers: Technology and Tools
- Frequency Synthesizers are everywhere in the most demanding Communication, Military, Medical and Industrial applications. Learn about the latest in low-phase noise frequency agile signal generation and the newest tools to push the performance envelope of your next design.
- Honeywell - Integrated Sensor Designs
- With reductions in sensor size and improved IC capabilities, the ability to integrate smaller, more intelligent solutions into customer applications has become a real option in the electronic design cycle. The ability to integrate calibration, signal filtering and self-diagnostics enables a shorter design cycle, improved manufacturing and the possibility of vendor reduction through the elimination of discreet components. The option to incorporate multiple sensing technologies, such as pressure and temperature, into one package reduces the number of components and eases integration. We will discuss design considerations such as data transformation, signal filtering, A to D conversion, self-diagnostics and other key parameters. We will also review the potential benefits that result from a more integrated sensing approach.
- Renesas- Design robust and reliable networked MCUs with CAN for industrial
applications
- Today's industrial applications require more and more bandwidth and reliability than ever before. CAN provides easy implementation, reliabilty, and expandability in one simple architecture. The topic of discussion will focus on the features and benefits of the CAN architecture and how they relate to industrial applications. In addition to the CAN specification this course will also discuss the features and benefits added by adopting the CANopen and DeviceNet specifications.
- Arrow Lighting - Driving High Power LEDs
- Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs) present many new and unique challenges for lighting engineers. One of the most difficult challenges to overcome is effectively powering the LED. In this seminar, we will show you how to navigate the LED driver landscape, and discuss the relative merits of various circuit designs.
9:50 AM - 11:05 AM Seminars Track II
- Texas Instruments - Choose your Weapon, MOSFET Selection for Synchronous BUCK POL power-stages
- Several key circuit performance parameters, such as no-load input current, peak and full load efficiency and thermal performance rely on careful MOSFET selection and synergy between controller and power stage components. Basic MOSFET parameter calculations and efficiency optimization will be covered along with advanced selection topics including controller limitations on MOSFET selection, Rdson current sense considerations and parasitic gate charge ratios effect on dV/dt turn-on of both Switching and Synchronous Rectifier MOSFETs.
- Freescale - Low Power - Low Cost Sensor Solutions
- Sensors are everywhere and the applications that will use them are growing rapidly - see what it takes to integrate low cost - low power sensors into your applications. Attendees will learn the practical side of the physics behind the technology for proximity, pressure, and 3 axis accelerometers and also gain a thorough understanding of the software aspects of Freescale's Sensor family - through the use of a new "Sensor Toolbox". The "Sensor ToolBox" allows the developer full access to the Source Code software for expedient code analysis and modification. Examples & Demo's of the top 10 algorithms will be supplied/applied for inertial freefall, motion, proximity, touchpad, liquid level, and pressure sensing. Enable your Sensor Applications quickly and easily with a complete System Solution from Freescale Semiconductor.
- STMicroelectronics - Advantages of using the Cortex-M3 Architecture including its Value in Low Power design, Presented by STMicroelectronics and the ARM Corporation
- Offering the highest performance with the lowest cost for a 32-bit mcu, the STM32 ARM Cortex-M3 based microcontroller from STMicroelectronics is revolutionizing the mcu market today. During this seminar, we will discuss the differences between the Cortex-M3 core, ARM7TDMI core, and the ARM9 core as it relates to microcontroller applications. We will then discuss the Cortex performance and low power enhancements and improved peripherals being used today in real world applications. Live demos will be shown.
- Intel - Improving System Reliability and Performance with Solid State Drives
- As improvements in flash technology push prices ever lower, viable replacements to Hard Disk Drives are within reach. This seminar will help you to understand the performance gains and reliability improvements achieved with SSD technology. This will be a detailed discussion of the technical points and merits of SSD along with live demos of multiple solid state drives types. Come and see how SSD technology can improve reliability and drive cost and power out of your next design.
- National Semiconductor - Constant-On-Time Control in Switching Regulators
- Constant On-time (COT) Buck Regulators have a wide appeal for a variety of applications because they are simple to implement. They don’t have poles and zeroes to compensate, and are flexible in terms of output voltage and switching frequency. In this presentation, we will discuss how COT works, its advantages/disadvantages, and why you should be using it in your next Buck design.
11:10AM–12:25PM Seminars Track III
- EPCOS - Optimizing selection of High Current Inductors and Cost drivers in magnetics designs
- High Current Inductor selection will cover important criteria to review, beyond inductance and Current, to optimize the performance of the Inductor in the circuit. In the second portion we'll review cost drivers in transformer and inductor designs including core materials and shapes, wire types, winding methods, etc. This will assist the designer in minimizing cost of the magnetics, which are typically one of the higher cost items in a power supply.
- Phoenix Contact - Phoenix Contact - Understanding Tin Whiskers
- What are Tin Whiskers? The presentation will discuss where they come from, the risks of tin whiskers. The IEC and JEDEC standards regarding Tin Whisker evaluation and preventing tin whiskers.
- NXP - Using USB Thumb Drives with Microcontrollers
- USB Flash Drives are a cost effective storage and update medium for many applications. However, getting them to work with an embedded system has never been a straight forward task. NXP will detail a free USB host software stack that enables the development of Mass Storage Device and MCU Flash programming over USB applications, including a demo using their ARM7 LPC2468 Microcontroller.
- Linear Technology - Using LTSpice
- What is LTspice? A FREE, full-function SPICE program that supports LTC power parts, opamps, and many other LTC parts. Used to design and simulate switch-mode power supplies. Can be used as a general purpose SPICE simulator. What Can LTspice Do? Schematic Capture. Circuit Simulations. AC Analysis. DC Sweeps. Noise Analysis. Has the ability to import discrete components from other vendors into the design. And more...
- On Semiconductor - Thermal Monitoring and Control
- ON Semiconductor will provide an overview of thermal monitoring techniques for various levels of system complexity. Topics to be covered include: Temperature Sensing approaches, Fan Control solutions and Advanced System Management Solutions. The Temperature Sensing discussion will provide an overview of the historical techniques used as well as improved methods to cancel environmental and measurement inaccuracies. Techniques used to communicate with devices for configuring and extracting thermal information will also be explored. For Fan Control solutions, the concepts for Speed Control, Speed Measurement, and Methods to control the feedback Loop will be described. Some of the newer control communication schemes will be examined such as SST (Simple Serial Transport) and PECI (Platform Environmental Control Interface) will be explored as how they are used with Advanced System Monitoring and Thermal Control methods.
1:30PM–2:45PM Seminars Track IV
- Littelfuse - Circuit Protection Techniques
- Market trends in ESD protection. Low cap silicon protection, PGB, Low cap multi-layer varistors. Circuit protection trends in various market segments. Consumer electronics, Telecom, White goods, Industrial. Discussion on Energy Star requirements. Latest developments in regulatory standards. Littelfuse product offering overview.
- Fairchild - Saving Energy: What's good about being Green? LLC Resonant Topology Promotes Green Designs
- The current "green movement" is forcing the design of more efficient power supplies. At the same time the evolution of electronics continues to force end products to shrink in size. Increasing the switching frequency reduces the size of power supplies at the expense of increased switching losses in the semiconductors in conventional hard switched converters. To resolve this dichotomy power supply designers need to look to new topologies. LLC resonant converters are one possible solution to this dilemma. With the characteristics of zero voltage switching and sinusoidal power processing, the LLC resonant topology allows for both high frequency operation and high efficiency as well as low EMI. This seminar will describe the LLC resonant topology and illustrate design considerations through a design example.
- Cypress - Consumer and Commercial Communications Infrastructure
- Wired and Wireless applications - What is driving choices and why do people want to connect this way. High bandwidth and low bandwidth requirements will be discussed. In addition, frequency selection for wireless solutions and communications over power lines for wired solutions will be presented
- Texas Instruments - Op Amp Stability
- Any system that has gain is subject to stability issues. The basic conditions necessary for extended ringing and even sustained oscillation are connected with phase shift and gain. With information from the product data sheet, TINA simulation, and bench tests a stable system can be realized. ADC performance is tied closely to the noise performance of the associated voltage reference. While well placed capacitance can reduce noise it can cause stability issues for the buffer amplifier. This provides a useful platform to study op amp stability issues.
2:55PM–4:05PM Seminars Track V
- Atmel - Meeting the Challenge of Implementing Low Power RF Solutions in a Noisy Environment
- The proliferation of wireless devices causes many challenges to the engineer hoping to deploy an RF-based product. The unpredictable presence of emitters such as microwave ovens or cordless phones and attenuators such as walls or water can impact the range and coverage of a wireless system. This presentation describes the issues to be faced in the ISM bands typically used for 802.15.4 and discusses strategies to overcome them. A review of the varying RF protocols that build on the 802.15.4 standard is also included.
- Altera – Implementing DSP Systems in FPGAs and ASICs
- Digital Signal Processing, or simply DSP, is a technology that is rapidly finding effective and efficient usage in advanced and common applications. Find ways to eliminate the challenge of moving from the processing system concept, to algorithm development, to implementation. Creating system architectures can be realized whether you need concurrent processing, sequential processing, or hybrid processing capabilities in your system. In this seminar, we will look at the DSP capabilities in terms of theoretical and practical application including High-performance and High-utilization Systems, Embedded Soft DSP Core, and DSP Builder Advanced Blockset reality for your evolving DSP world.
- Freescale - Graphical User Interfaces & Robotic Vision
- Learn how to implement Graphical User Interfaces using standard LCD displays into your embedded products. This session will go through LCD technologies & topologies. Attendees will learn about LCD display types and interfacing to Common System Architectures using Graphical User Interfaces. Discussion on the tradeoffs of software and hardware implementations as applied to the embedded space. Demos will include Multimedia (Flash Media) Movie playback, an IP Camera, the PDK development tool, and a Computer Vision/Recognition demo - all enabled by Freescale Semiconductor.
- Numonyx - Phase Change: A New Memory Alternative
- Today’s non-volatile memories are based on a floating gate structure. Over time these memories have increased in capability while reducing cost and lithography. With memory scaling becoming increasingly challenging, an explosion of new memory concepts have emerged recently. One of the most viable of these is Phase Change Memory. Phase Change Memory (PCM) is a term used to describe a class of non-volatile memory devices that employ a reversible phase change in materials to store information. PCM exploits differences in the electrical resistivity of a material in different phases.
