Surface-mount Trimmer Resistor Packages

To support the page on Through-hole Trimmer Packages, I added a new page to cover Surface-Mount Trimmer Packages.
Both pages use the links to Resistor Terms at the top of the page; As in these definitions:
Adjustable Resistor.
Lead-Screw Resistor.
Non-Wire Wound Resistor.
Potentiometer.
Reostat.
Trimmer Resistor.
Variable Resistor.
The page covering companies that Manufacturer Potentiometers works off the link. There also also links to Derating Potentiometers, and Wire-Wound Potentimeter Derating. There are dozens of other pages relating to resistors and Trimmers.
A Trimmer is a variable resistor that is produce that only supports a full adjustments, a trimmer is not made to handle continuous adjustments or changes. Each of those two pages show four or five different examples of package styles.

Graphic; Variable Resistor, Wire-Wound Derating Curve [MIL-R-39015].

Manufacturers, Bus Definitions and pinouts

A few new pages have been added over the last few weeks. Today I added a page to cover Manufacturers of Laser Diodes. I also added a link to a number of pages including Diode manufacturers, Zener Diode Manufacturers, and Companies that produce Varactor Diodes. The page only contains three manufacturers, but I'll get it updated in the next few days.

Last night I added a page to cover PS3 connectors, not sure why but it is an electrical interface. Looks like one of the pins may contain an error, but I added a note to indicate that. The new PS3 page is linked off this bus page; Interface Buses, 'P'.

Last week I split up one of the Printed Wiring Board Terms page, but I don't remember which one;
PWB Terms, A - O.
PWB Terms, P - R.
PWB Terms, S.
PWB Terms, T - Z.
Of course many pages have been updated, but only new pages get listed here.

Resistor Attenuators

I added a new page to cover schematics of different styles of Resistor Attenuator Networks. The page should support the section of Resistor Terms and Resistor Attenuator Manufacturers.

Normally these devices will be surface mount components so the common term will be Chip Attenuator. The new page shows schematics for the Pi attenuator, T attenuator, and L attenuator.

HCSL Components

A new page was added last week to cover HCSL Clock Oscillator Manufacturers. HCSL switching logic is used with PCIe to name just one interface.

The new page is linked off the main Oscillator Manufacturers vendor page. There is also a link of the Engineering Acronyms pages.


Photo credit; army.mil, Rifleman Radio

Solid State Drive Vendors

Added a new page on Solid State Drive [SSD] manufacturers a few weeks ago. SSD may also stand for Solid State Disk, depending on what page you may check. The page started as a copy of Hard Disk Drive [HDD] manufacturers.

The page still has a few notes relating to HDD vendors, but has many more listings that relate to SSD vendors. There seem to be only two main form factors;
Laptops, at 1.8"
Desktop at 2.5"
They also seem to be supplied with one of two main interface standards;
Serial ATA [SATA], SATA-I, or SATA-II
Parallel ATA [PATA]

These are drop-in replacements to a normal HDD devices, and operate much faster.

The smaller 64GB SSD's don't seem to cost that much any more, at a tad less than $200. However 64GB is almost to small to use as a main hard drive. I purchased a 10,000 rpm hard drive a few years ago as a data drive, so I guess they may function as a non OS drive. I wouldn't attempt to put Windows Vista on a 64GB drive.

I see 80GB and 128GB drives running into the $300 range, still to small to be usable. The larger drives containing 250GB of memory are ranging from $700 to $900, which could be the total cost of a new computer. Maybe by next year the price will come down so most people could purchase one with out any sticker shock.

I found one 8GB PATA device for $100, not really sure why I wouldn't use a USB Flash device at that point.

I also noted that normal desktop PC drives use MLC devices, while server side drives use SLC devices. Definition of MLC.

A related page covers Hybrid Hard Disk Drive [HHD] manufacturers. Hybrid drives have a platter but also contain more flash memory operating as a larger cache. I'll bet these don't stay around much longer than next year once SSD memory prices are reduced.

Designing an Equipment Chassis

Two new pages have been added to the section covering How to Design an Electronic Chassis. The section spans about 44 html pages and attempts to cover all the issues when designing an Electronic Equipment Chassis.

The two new pages cover Wire Selection, and AC Power Modules. However; over the same time there have also been a few pages that were up-dated, including; Connector Dust Caps, Slot By-Pass Cards, Chassis Wire Selection, Slot Filler Panels, and a few others.

At any rate, there is now more information in the section that cover more topics in greater detail. There were other pages updated not listed here, but these were the major updates.

The hits to this section are down a bit over the last year, but only by about 50 visits a week, or 200 a month. It could be the reduction in hits is just due to the time of year..... What ever, any way the up-dates will not be seen by Google for several weeks.

The Bounce rate for this section hovers around 60%.

Dsub Connector Gender Changer

Added a new page to define Gender Changers. The page is linked off one of the Dictionary of Engineering Terms pages, and off the Manufacturers of D-Sub Connectors page. I'll start to add companies that manufacturer gender changers as I find them.

The graphic is an adapter and not a gender changer. D-sub is short hand for D-Subminiature.

Related pages:
Dsub Shell Dimensions.
Dsub Insert Arrangements.
Mil-C-24308 Connector Manufacturers.
IDC D-sub Shell Dimensions.
Pin/Plug D-sub Shell Dimensions.
9-pin Dsub Insert Arrangement.
25-pin Dsub Insert Arrangements.

An Insert Arrangement is another way to indicate a connector pin out. Insert Arrangements indicate the pin numbering of a connector but does not indicate what signal may be on a pin. The term Signal Assignment is used to define a particular pin with an electrical signal. Signal Assignments for any number of interface buses may be found on the Personal Computer Buses page.

It's a bit early in the day, the virus scanner is running, my server is off-line, and I just can't figure out what to say ~ so I'll have to get back to it and fix it later.

Waveguide Manufacturers

There has been a listing of Waveguide manufacturers posted for a while now. A few days ago I added a page to cover Manufacturers of Waveguide Gaskets. Like many new page additions its small and only contains a few vendors, but over time more manufacturers will be added.

Related pages;
Antenna Tracking Systems.
Antenna Communication Towers.
RF Power Amplifier Manufacturers.
RF Component Manufacturers.

Definitions:
Antenna Terms.
Radar Terms.

Diode Arrays

Added a few pages to cover Diodes Arrays, off the main Diode Terms page.

One page covers Diode Arrays in a Flat package [Flat Pack Diode Arrays]. While another page covers Diode Arrays in a DIP package [DIP package Diode Arrays].

Both pages provide diode types, schematics and name designations.

Related pages, include:
Diode Manufactures,
Zener Diode Manufacturers,
Derating Diodes,
Zener Diode Terms.
Graphic; Diode Array 20-pin Flat Pack, Common Anode / Common Cathode.

Lithium-ion Batteries

Added a new page to hold some data on Lithium-ion Batteries. It holds a short description, and then some standard sizes and styles. The page is linked off the main page of Battery manufacturers.

Additional pages on this topic include Industrial Battery manufacturers, and manufacturers of Battery Sockets.

Battery Control IC Manufacturers.
Battery Management Buses; SMbus, and I2C Bus.

Battery Sockets

A new page was added to cover Battery Holders, Battery Socket manufacturers. The new page is a copy of another, so many of the listing below the dotted line need to be removed. The original page covered Battery Manufacturers.
A related page covers Industrial Battery Manufacturers.

Update; that page has now been updated but still only shows about a dozen manufacturers of battery sockets. I did just notice that many of the listed companies produce sockets for Lithium batteries, so a link to Lithium-ion Batteries was added. The page provides standard sizes for Lithium-ion batteries, and it also happens to be a new page.

D-Sub Connector Insert Arragenments

There are a number of pages that deal with D Sub-miniature connectors on the engineering web site. The main two are Manufacturers of Commercial D-Sub Connectors, and Manufacturers of Military D-Sub Connectors. Military connectors meet the MIL-DTL-24308 specification.

A graphic of a D-Subminiature outline, and a table of D-Sub mechanical dimensions is provided to determine the different sizes available. Along with a new page providing Insert Arrangements for D-sub connectors.

9-pin D-Sub Insert Arrangements,
15-pin D-Sub Insert Arrangements, Size 22 Contacts.
15-pin D-Sub Insert Arrangements, Size 20 Contacts.
25-pin D-Sub Insert Arrangements,
26-pin D-Sub Insert Arrangements,
37-pin D-Sub Insert Arrangements,
44-pin D-Sub Insert Arrangements,
50-pin D-Sub Insert Arrangements,
62-pin D-Sub Insert Arrangements,
78-pin D-Sub Insert Arrangements,
104-pin D-Sub Insert Arrangements.

So the Insert Arrangements for D-subs gives the dimensions and locations of the individual pins, while the Dimensional outline for D-subs gives the case out-line. In addition, you can determine the pin location or pin numbering using the 'insert arrangement' pages.

Although in declining usage on PC's the three most common sizes used are the 9-pin [Serial Port], the 15-pin [Video Port], and the 25-pin [Parallel Port].

A related page, general listing of Manufacturers of Military Grade Connectors.

Connector Manufacturers

A few new pages have been added over the last week. Tonight I pushed the listing of Manufacturers of Header Connectors onto its own page. The link reside on the main page for Manufacturers of Connectors.

Also off the dictionary section, 'P' Engineering Terms, a new page was added to cover the term, Pulse Shape. and related terms to describe a waveform.

And in the same dictionary section, 'S' Engineering Terms, another new term was added to hold a larger graphic of a Synchro. Same pic that was on the previous page, but a bit larger.

High Voltage Power Supplies

A new page was added to cover power supplies over, 1KV. I stated with the normal page of Manufacturers of Power Supplies and begun to push some of those listings to a new page for High voltage supplies. The new link is just above the start of the listing for 'normal' power supplies as ; High Voltage Power Supplies.

The new link will cover AC-to-DC Power supplies which operate above one Kilo-Volt [1KV] and save some search time for people looking for very high voltage outputs..

All the other power supply links still persist on each page, and the new page is not complete ~ but will be complete by the week end

GDDR5 Pinout for ICs

A new page was added to address the IC pinout for GDDR5 IC's. The main GDDR page is located at GDDR DIMM Descriptions. This is the only pin out listed for GDDR IC's, GDDR5 IC Pin out. How ever ther are a number of pages that list PC Memory Module Pinouts.

GDDR5 integrated circuites are being produced by at least two companies. The diagram is from a Qimonda data sheet

Locking Connector Types

A new page was added to hold a graphic for a Bayonet style locking connector. The page is linked off the page covering the definition of a BNC Connector. A small definition is also provided. Both pages are part of the Definition of Radar Terms section.

Also added a graphic holding page to cover the definition of Terminal Lugs. The Terminal Lugs diagrams reside in the Engineering Glossary of Terms section.
In addition to the pictures referenced above a few others were added to pre-existing pages. A few additional entries were also added to the Definition of Resistor Terms section, but no new pages added.

I also moved the Balun Definition to its own page as the definition was being duplicated on three other pages. The new page covering Baluns is linked from a number of pages including the Antenna Terms section, and Engineering Dictionary section. Of course each of the new pages have been added to the site-map, linked of the index page.

Circular Connector Manufacturers

Finally added some text to the Sealed Circular Connector page located on interfacebus.net. The page was created a few months back... So far the page is a collection of links to pages that list manufacturers that produce round connectors on interfacebus.com.

The listing groups all the different pages into one list, which should make round connectors easier to locate.

Looks like the web site could use a few more pages dealing with Military Spec connectors.

Manufacturers of RF Twinax Connectors

I added a new page that contains the definition of a Twinax connector. Remember it's a new page and contains little data. The link is off the RF Radar Terms section.

Remember because so many sites relay on hits from search engines, adding pages may not help a web site. A new page may place well in a search for some terms but because it takes three months to get a page rank may not place well for many terms ~ which is why they get up-loaded as the page is generated.

Even as new pages are added and older pages are up-dated, site hits are down this week. Page visits are down at least 300 per day this week, looks like about 7,800 visits per day ~not page views. It must be common when so many sites depend on search engine traffic. Regardless of what you do the search engine may bring in less traffic. I think interfacebus.com takes in 75% of its traffic from search engines. A small reduction in search engine traffic results in a major drop of visitors. I see it all the time........

Also up-dated the manufacturers of Connector Dust caps page.

Determine Maximum Fuse Voltages

How do you determine the maximum operating voltage of a fuse? That's a good question, and it depends on the current load the fuse sees and if the applied voltage is AC volts or DC volts. Most applications really just boil down to the inrush current the fuse may encounter. However many applications indicate a large difference between the maximum AC voltage and the maximum DC voltage a particular fuse can handle.

A new page has been created to address the difference between maximum DC voltage and AC voltage.

How to determine if an AC fuse works at DC voltages. The new page address the issue of AC fuses working with DC voltage. Most fuse will indicate if they operate at an AC voltage, DC voltage or both. Data sheets will also indicate if there is a difference in voltages between AC or DC operation.

Pages that compliment the maximum voltage faq include;
How to Derate a Fuse.
Manufacturers of Mechanical Fuses.
Manufacturers of Circuit Breakers.
Manufacturers of Fuse Holders.
Passive Fuse Manufacturers and Surge Protection Device Manufacturers are also listed on the main Fuse manufacturers page.

VME Mechanical Interface

I added two pages to cover the mechanical standards for the VME interface. The first page covers the new mechanical specification that deals with the VPX card format; REDI, Ruggedized Enhanced Design Implementation Form Factors. While the second page addresses the original VME form function, IEEE-1011.

The IEEE1101 page was added just for completeness and currently only points to a mechanical drawing of the VME board sizes that have been on the site for a number of years now.

The REDI standard defines the new direction with the VME bus, using the VPX card. The VME road map is moving in a new direction leaving the old legacy form factors behind.

COTS Manufacturers:
..... Manufacturers of VME Boards.
..... Manufacturers of VPX Boards.
..... Manufacturers of VXS Boards.