OnTrack: The PCB Design Podcast

By Altium LLC.

The PCB Design Podcast features conversations on all facets of PCB Design and Hardware Development... more

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How many episodes does OnTrack: The PCB Design Podcast have?

The podcast currently has 301 episodes available.

OnTrack: The PCB Design Podcast episodes:

March 08, 2023Achieving Diversified Electronics Supply Chain
In this episode, we continue the discussion on diversifying the electronic supply chain. Our guest Case Engelen the CEO of Titoma shares his insight about moving some of the manufacturing to other Southeast Asian countries and South America.
Watch this episode now and check out the show notes and additional resources below.
Show Highlights:
Case Engelen introduces himself and his company Titoma
Offshoring, onshoring, and diversifying supply chain, why do the majority of components manufacturing may stay in China for 5 more years?
Building prototypes and optimizing your design following the factory’s specifications
Case talks about the importance of component architecture early during the design phase
The difference between how US and Chinese market their product and their selling strategies
Diversifying manufacturing in Southeast Asia and South America, Taiwan is a little more expensive than China, but Columbia is more competitive when it comes to cost
The advanced manufacturing capabilities in China are quite hard to beat
What is “bifurcation”?
What does the future of electronics production and sourcing and procurement look like?
Links and Resources:
Connect with Case Engelen on LinkedIn
Visit Titoma Website
Watch the Previous Related Episodes:
Mastering Your PCB Design Tool as the Industry Evolves with Stephen Chavez
Mitigating Risk Factors for PCB Manufacturing Lead Times
Data Security, 5G and Onshore PCB Manufacturing with Dr. Rob Spalding

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44min
March 01, 2023A Lookback to the Evolution of the PCB Industry with Happy Holden
Happy Holden, a legend in the PCB Industry and one of our favorite Altium Industry Expert contributors gives us a trip to his 53 years of experience in the industry. From a chemical engineer, and PCB manufacturing expert to an educator with his countless contribution to the PCB industry’s wealth of knowledge through his books, column, and keynote presentations.
Watch this episode now
Show Highlights:
Introduction to Happy Holden and an overview of his career in the PCB Industry
What drove the PCB manufacturing off-shore? The printed circuit industry has been all over the map, to begin with
Happy shares his early years in printed circuit manufacturing
Comparing CAD tools from the 80s and the present – computers, calculators, and software
Happy talks about photonic circuits back in 1998 and how it is a hundred thousand times more capable than electronic communication and have no signal integrity issue
HP’s first notebook computer
Happy retired from HP and moved to Taiwan
Happy started working at Gentex Michigan
The beginning of offshoring the PCB manufacturing and fabrication
In Asia, the printing circuit board is like printing money. It is the most profitable industry in the region
Globalization took over the industry – emphasis on profit versus jobs
Diversifying the supply chain. How to bring some of the manufacturing sides of the industry back to the US?
The $52 Billion budget (CHIPS Act 2022) is just a downpayment to bring the 30 years that were lost
Would companies start manufacturing their own products?
How did HDI technology come about?
Links and Resources:
Connect with Happy Holden on LinkedIn
Read Happy Holden’s Articles on Altium’s Resource Page
Read Happy Holden’s Biography on HPMuseum.org
Buy Happy Holden’s Printed Circuits Handbook, Seventh Edition
Download FREE Ebook I-Connect007 Publishes Automation eBook by Happy Holden
Watch the Previous Episode with Happy Holden: The Father of HDI PCBs
...more
1h 16min
February 22, 2023Power Testing PCB
Functional testing is when you power up an electronic device for the first time and then perform voltage rail checks and programming of processors, and more. And this is exactly what FixturFab offers their customer.
In this episode, Zach is talking with the co-founders of FixturFab, Duncan Lowder and Joe Selvik. They will have a chat about automated test fixtures and turnkey systems that aid low to medium electronic production to deliver successful devices.
Watch this episode here.
Show Highlights:
Jow Selvic and Duncan Lowder introduction and engineering backgrounds
What is FixturFab’s test fixture? Duncan briefly explains how it works – the mechanical, electrical, and software aspects of it
A turnkey test system designs and delivers specific test cases and dives into detail about how a circuit board was designed and gathers reports
Bolina an IIOT device deployment engine allows the management of Test Fixtures remotely
An ideal customer for FixturFab is anyone who designs or manufactures their hardware, the best time to initiate the testing is before finalizing the board layout or during the prototyping phase
Currently, FixturFab caters to low to medium-volume production, but they definitely are looking forward to eventually being in an automated SMT (Surface Mount Technology) line
Coming next is the Test System in a Box, the IKEA or the “protolab” for test fixtures
Links and Resources:
Connect with Joe Selvik on LinkedIn
Connect with Duncan Lowder on LinkedIn
Visit FixturFab website
Read: Generating an Altium Test Point Report
Watch related episodes:
Electronics Manufacturability and Reliability with QA Guru Cheryl Tulkoff
Mitigating Risk Factors for PCB Manufacturing Lead Times
...more
43min
February 14, 2023The Rise of AI Interference
In this episode, we are fortunate to have two key personalities at Luxonis, a hardware, firmware, software, AI, and simulation company. Erik Kokalj, director of application engineering at Luxonis, and Bradley Dillon, CEO of Luxonis discuss how and who can benefit from AI technology.
Tune in and make sure to check out the show notes and additional resources below.
Show Highlights:
Introduction to Luxonis and its founding on April 2019
The liDAR and radar as an imaging technology, Erik briefly explains the technology behind it
Bradley shares why they decided to open-source some aspects of their platform and design
Luxonis’s AI training, AI conversion, and AI deployment onto hardware are all open-source, for their customers can quickly develop their own model and then deploy it on the device itself
Future design updates, miniaturization, and thermal management
What are some of the industrial applications that are utilizing the Luxonis imaging technology? Beekeeping was unexpected!
Robotic applications on robotic cars, Zach and Erik talk about action recognition on top of object recognition
Bradley talks about series 3 products and what’s coming in terms of capabilities – processing power, more AI inference
Resources and Links:
Connect with Bradley Dillon on LinkedIn
Connect with Erik Kokalj on LinkedIn
Checkout Luxonis Website
Watch Luxonis featured on Altium Story: How Luxonis uses Altium 365 to innovate AI Vision systems faster
Connect with Zach Peterson on LinkedIn
...more
39min
February 07, 2023The True Benefits of Printed Electronics
In this episode, we are very excited to have Jesus Zozaya, CEO of Voltera, and Matt Ewertowski, product manager at Voltera. We will discuss pushing the boundaries in electronics design through printed electronics.
Join us and together let’s discover the many benefits of printed electronics from expedited prototyping, proof of concept, and academic research.
Show Highlights:
Introduction to Jesus Zozaya, CEO of Voltera, and Matt Ewertowski, product manager at Voltera
Jesus takes the lead in explaining what Voltera does, and introduced their first product – V-one
Matt explains the difference between Printed Electronics and additive manufacturing process
Electronics printer pushes the limits and welcomes new possibilities and opportunities for new materials in the electronic design space
Voltera designed NOVA (their second product) with users in mind, they created a tool that all electrical engineers can utilize regardless of their skills in material science
Can you do stack-ups using printed electronics?
Jesus talks about a customer who created heaters directly on the drone’s wings to melt the ice when flying in cold temperature
A Voltera customer printed electronics directly on a textile (face mask) that will allow a smartphone app to track the level of CO2 on the face mask
Mark dives deep into the capabilities of NOVA
Who is the target market for V-one and how does it differentiate from NOVA
The V-one is seen to be utilize more for prototyping, meanwhile NOVA is popular with academic and R and D research
Printed electronics do not replace traditional marketing, but it aids to expedite the process of getting the proof of concept done

Links and Resources:
Connect with Jesus Zezoya on LinkedIn
Connect with Matt Ewertowski on LinkedIn
Visit Voletra’s website
Related Podcast Episodes:
3D Printed Circuit Boards for Fast Prototyping
The Promising and Challenging Future of 3D Printed Electronics
Materials Science and Manufacturing of Better PCB
Connect with Zach Peterson on LinkedIn

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42min
January 25, 2023Picotest’s Water-Cooled Probe
Having Steve Sandler in this episode is such a treat! He talks about his presentations at the upcoming DesignCon 2023 in Santa Clara. He gives us a deep dive into some very complex engineering topics, including measuring the PDN Flatness and the state space model.
Download this episode
Show Highlights:
Steve Sandler is in the running for Engineering of the Year along with Ken Wyatt
Steve is doing a two-and-a-half-hour tutorial on PSMR, PSOR, and PSMR testing at the DesignCon. Molex and Tektronix are both participating in the live demonstration
He s also doing a presentation with Heidi Barnes, Bandanin, and Ben Denon
A lot of conferences are going virtual. The reach is undeniably great, however, what are the pros and the cons? What is valuable to who?
Steve talks about the conception of Picotest in the US
Picotest made the very first water-cooled probe which he will be showing at the DesignCon
Innovative solutions can take decades from conception to fruition, Steve shares his PdD thesis from 2011 that got him ahead of the curve
Steve deeps dive into the water-cooled probe, how it works, and the problems it eliminates
21:34 Power supply stability is critical in space,
23:28 What does it mean to quantify the flatness of the PDN? Steve co-authored a paper with Scott Witcher which will be presented at the DesignCon
26:25 Steve Sandler wrote a paper in 2015: Target Impedance Limitations and Rogue Wave Assessments on PDN Performance
31:29 FACTS! Computers in Space Station are being reset every 40 minutes
33:13 Steve stresses the importance of simulation and gives engineers a tip: “Start out with proven models and you'll get there. Get enough confidence.“
34:39 Steve explains why it is necessary to find the “Q” to measure PDN Flatness
43:19 Innovation could have happened earlier, Steve talks about the typical economic problems that could be hindering technological advancements
47:51 Steve gives us a brief deep dive into the “state space model” and what it’s attempting to quantify
Links and Resources:
Connect with Steve Sandler on LinkedIn
Visit Picotest website
Check out Steve Sandler's Books
Register to DesignCon 2023
...more
1h
January 17, 2023Accessible Education for PCB Designers
One of PCEA’s (Printed Circuit Engineering Association) goals is to provide accessible education, affordable to everyone in the electronics industry.
In this episode, we are fortunate to have two passionate educators in the industry, Mike Buetow and Mike Creeden. We will talk about the PCEA’s efforts to use all possible platforms to promote educational programs for design engineers.
PCEA, it's an international network of engineers, designers, fabricators, assemblers…anyone who is involved in printed circuit development. And we promote Printed Circuit Engineering as a profession. We're looking at trying to take information, new design concepts, get them down into the manufacturing side, and then also to communicate those manufacturing constraints and make sure that they are communicated back to the design side. -Mike Buetow
Watch the episode here
Show Highlights:
Introduction to PCEA and updates on its acquisition of key assets of UP Media Group
Mike Buetow talks about the PCB East conference reboot
Who can benefit from PCEA’s educational initiatives?
Mike Creeden emphasizes the importance of in-person learning. “Online is good, but it lacks some retention…but in-person learning, you retain more,” he explains.
To collaborate, educate and inspire is what’s behind PCEA educational efforts
PCEA is a volunteer-driven organization
Mike Creeden will be at the https://www.ipcapexexpo.org/in San Diego
Mike Creeden debunks misconceptions about PCB manufacturing facilities, the skills involved, the compensation, and more
There are some issues in design education around packaging, the Insulectro booth at IPC Apex 2023 will offer valuable knowledge about packaging
PCEA membership is free, you can register here
Mentorship programs are something to look forward to
Currently, PCEA has chapters in Europe, Mexico, Canada, Australia, and across the United States
Links and Resources:
Visit PCEA’s website
Connect with Mike Creeden on LinkedIn
Connect with Mike Buetow on LinkedIn
Watch Previous Related Episodes:
New Printed Circuit Engineering Course: PCE EDU
Mike Buetow on PCB West

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51min
January 10, 2023Better PCB Buying with Greg Papandrew
Expedite your transition from prototype to scale with the help of an experienced PCB broker! In this episode, a returning guest joins us to discuss everything that involves cost-effective PCB manufacturing. Greg Papandrew, a PCB buying and selling expert, gives us a comprehensive understanding of PCB cost drivers and tips on a good supply chain strategy.
Watch this episode here
Show Highlights:
The process of buying and selling, Greg Papandrew is a PCB broker with 30 years of experience in the industry
Greg emphasizes the importance of quoting smartly, learning when, where, and how to save money without sacrificing the PCB quality
What is a good supply chain strategy?
Greg dives deep into his role as a PCB broker, and his involvement in the decision making involving specs, materials, cost, and more
Sending too much information can be problematic, and it involves the vulnerability of intellectual property
Good communication with the PCB manufacturer and fabricator can go a long way; asking the right questions can help with the production of high-quality products with a fair pricing
What is the anatomy of a complete data package?
What's in a File list and a README file
Greg answers, at what stage of the process does a PCB designer or manufacturer approach a PCB broker?
Links and Resources:
Connect with Greg Papandrew on LinkedIn
Watch a previous episode with Greg Panandrew: How to Buy PC Boards From a Board Shop
Watch Greg’s video: How to Avoid Self-inflicted PCB Costs
Visit DirectPCB - Better Board Buying website
Connect with Zach on LinkedIn
Visit Nexar website
Visit Octopart website
Claim the special offer for Podcast listeners only!
...more
45min
January 10, 2023FPGAs Are Moving Beyond Prototyping
If you look at the way people have used FPGAs, they are a miracle product in many ways. -Mark Oliver
Our guest Mark Oliver, VP of marketing at Efinix talks about the evolving role of FPGAs in the industry beyond prototyping. Mark will give us a very insightful use of FPGA as an efficient custom silicon solution and will go deep on the importance of RISC-V for processor designs.
Watch this episode here
Show Highlights:
Introduction to Efinix, an FPGA company
Mark starts off by addressing the inefficient ways designers use FPGAs and how this has helped them develop a product that can be utilized from prototyping and straight to high-volume manufacturing
Efinix FPGAs are cost-effective, low-power, and small-form efficient for custom silicon solution
The common FPGAs integration including the SIP (Session Initial Protocol) implementation
FPGA market is set to explode because it is going in the same direction as the current industry growth
they are designed as mid-volume production solutions with the potential for scalability
Given that the industry is dominated by software engineers Efinix moves its course to RISC-V processor integration
What is RISC-V and why it is so important for processor design, specifically for FPGAs?
FPGAs already offer great benefits and there will be more to come
Links and Resources:
Connect with Mark Oliver on LinkedIn
Visit Efinix website
Read Related Articles:
How to Start an FPGA PCB Layout For Your Embedded System
Designing for the FPGA Pin Mapper
SoC FPGA Boasts RISC-V Processor
Watch Related Altium Academy Videos:
FPGA Pins Explained!
FPGA and BGA PCB Power Delivery Best Practices
Connect with Zach on LinkedIn
Full OnTrack Podcast Library
Altium Website
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49min
December 27, 2022OnTrack Podcast 2022 Year in Review
Join us as we reflect on the best moments and the coolest guests we've had on the OnTrack podcast this year. 2012 has been a whirlwind year for the electronics industry–chip shortages, and a supply chain crunch. Altium has passed several milestones, as well as releasing an education program. And there have been some groundbreaking reports from industry groups highlighting the need for workforce training and development, and workforce shortages coming on the horizon.
Watch the episode here
Claim the special offer for Podcast listeners only
Show Highlights:
One of Altium’s Milestone is the Altium Education Program
In most of the episodes, the issue of automotive chips shortage comes up coupled with the passing of the PCB Act
PCB Packaging, and production of integrated circuit substrates
Most requested repeat guests and new faces
Links and Resources:
Watch all the OnTrack Podcast Episode
Register at Altium Education for Free
Connect with Zach on LinkedIn
Visit Nexar website
Visit Octopart website
Claim the special offer for Podcast listeners only
...more
11min

FAQs about OnTrack: The PCB Design Podcast:

How many episodes does OnTrack: The PCB Design Podcast have?

The podcast currently has 301 episodes available.

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