HW 1

1. Run through the Altium tutorial.

2. On a PCB, what does the unit “ounces of copper” mean (as in “2 oz copper”, “0.5 oz copper”) ?

3. If I have a wire that is 1mm wide and 100 mm long on a 1 oz copper PCB,

• a. How thick is it?
• b. What are the dimensions in mils?
• c. What is the resistance at DC?
• d. Considering skin depth, what is the resistance at 1 MHz, 100 MHz and 2.4 GHz? Should I worry much about these resistances with milliamp currents and/or 50 Ohm termination resistances?

1. Look online for information about transmission lines on PCBs. Try to find:

• a. The signal wavelength as a function of frequency of signals and type of PCB.
• b. support for Bob’s claim that below 100 MHz we don’t have to worry much.
• c. Suggestions for what to do with 500 MHz signals (ML clock)
• d. Suggestions for what to do with 2.4 GHz signals (radio on MS chip)

1. Read spec docs. Try to find the first things that you might test. Regulated voltages, clock frequencies, supply ripple, 3-wire bus, boot signals of any kind, … For each thing that you want to measure, list the equipment that you would need to measure it, e.g. power supply, oscilloscope, function generator, logic analyzer, spectrum analyzer, vector network analyzer.