FREE Seminar: Power Supply Design Techniques for Signal Integrity and EMC by Daniel Beeker

Seminar abstract:

From the basic concepts of electromagnetic field behavior to good design practices for power supply design, this webinar will help you to improve your product designs. It’s all about the space!

Part 1: Electromagnetic fields for normal folks: Show me the pictures and hold the equations, please!

The material presented will be focused on the physics of electromagnetic energy basic principles, presented in easy-to-understand language with plenty of diagrams. Attendees will discover how understanding EM field behavior can help design PCBs that will be more robust and have better EMC performance. This is not rocket science but an easy-to-understand application of PCB geometry.

Part 2: Effective PCB design: Techniques to improve performance

As IC geometries continue to shrink and switching speeds increase, designing electromagnetic systems and printed circuit boards to meet the required signal integrity and EMC specifications has become even more challenging. A new design methodology is required. Specifically, the utilization of an electromagnetic physics-based design methodology to control the field energy in your design will be discussed. This training module will review the development process and provide guidelines for building successful, cost-effective printed circuit boards.

After introducing EM field behavior, this course will describe several effective methods for designing the spaces used to direct EM fields on a PCB. Simple rules for managing these fields will be described, based on one fundamental behavior. How fast does the switch change states? This defines the requirements for the power distribution and the geometry of the space between the output of the switch and the receiver. Several real-world examples of the use of these principles, both for designing compliant boards and for analyzing EMC failures are presented.

Part 3: Novel power distribution system design

This presentation will present a simple EM physics and geometry-based approach to designing power distribution networks on PCBs. The simple rules discussed can be used to reduce power supply noise and improve EMC from the input power connection to the IC die. New research will be presented on the impact of discrete components on radiated and conducted emissions, with an emphasis on cost analysis.

Part 4: Feeding the beast: Consumption-based PCB design

This session is a step-by-step guideline for determining the PCB design requirements based on device energy consumption requirements. Wave cycle times and transmission line capacity form the basis of this philosophy. The session will begin with a review of EM field behavior and transmission line design, then outline a process for analyzing the real power delivery challenge posed by a high-performance microprocessor. Starting with the DC current specification, we will use the device package pinout to determine the necessary PCB networks required to support the delivery of power to the device. The course will center on the LS1043 Network processor, with a focus on the core power supply requirements (7 A/uS). The package pinout and clock frequency will be used to determine the real “coulombs per wave cycle” that the PDN must support. This will then be used to design both local storage requirements and connecting structures. A spreadsheet will be presented, which can be used to do a quantitative analysis of the transmission line capability based on the impedance and length, so the number of wave cycles needed to deliver the required charge. This perspective can be used in the initial design phase or to evaluate existing designs. EMC test results from a production design, MPC-LS-VNP-MOD, using this approach, will be presented.