This IR remote controlled dimmer works with a triac and in its standard configuration is suitable for light electric heaters and incandescent lamps up to about 1000 watts. The PIC microcontroller used in the project can learn control codes from almost any remote control. Here’s power dimming from the comfy chair. by Juan Canton
Free Elektor Article: Infrared Remote Controlled Dimmer – [Link]
Today, SnapEDA – a company that helps engineers design electronics faster by removing barriers – is launching a new KiCad plugin, allowing designers to search and download its computer-aided design (CAD) models directly within the KiCad PCB design environment.
KiCad is a free and open-source software that has been gaining popularity in the PCB design industry. Over the last few years, it has been growing at the same rate as the industry’s leading PCB tools in terms of design activity on SnapEDA’s professional PCB design community.
With the new SnapEDA KiCad Plugin, engineers can now access all of the magic of SnapEDA right from within KiCad. Engineers can discover and download component data (including symbols, footprints and 3D models) into their library of choice — and access other types of component data, like pricing — without ever having to leave KiCad’s PCB design environment.
Additionally, KiCad users will also benefit from live updates to the library. SnapEDA’s Component Engineering team adds thousands of new components each week, which are synced with the plugin in real-time.
“KiCad is an inspiring tool to be able to support because of their ethos of making electronics design open and accessible,” said Natasha Baker, CEO & Founder of SnapEDA. “Although it has its roots in academia and gained initial traction with hobbyists, we’re now seeing increased adoption among professional users, which made it the perfect time to create this helpful new tool.”
The new SnapEDA KiCad Plugin provides access to millions of CAD models, which are completely free for engineers to download and use in their designs. SnapEDA works closely with component suppliers to provide vetted digital models for its semiconductor and electromechanical products, which are created with its patented technology.
About SnapEDA
SnapEDA is on a mission to build the world’s most engineer-centric company. We help engineers innovate faster by removing barriers. Our search engine for electronics design helps over one million engineers design electronics faster each year. By providing ready-to-use building blocks for circuit board design via our website and plugins for PCB design tools, we shave days off product development, so that designers can focus on product optimization and innovation. Our community of professional engineers is making everything from medical devices to electric airplanes. SnapEDA is funded by Y Combinator and private investors.
Learn more at www.snapeda.com
Axiomtek – a world-renowned leader relentlessly devoted in the research, development and manufacture of series of innovative and reliable industrial computer products of high efficiency – is pleased to announce the PICO317, its new fanless Pico-ITX SBC powered by the onboard quad-core Intel® Atom® x5-E3940 processor (code name: Apollo Lake). This tiny 2.5-inch embedded board can withstand a wide operating temperature range of -40°C to +70°C (-40°F to +158°F) for use in harsh and space-constraint environments. It comes with dual-display capability through 4K-ready HDMI and 18/24-bit single/dual channel LVDS. Combined with a rugged design and high-speed processing, the PICO317 is suitable for a variety of industrial IoT applications, including industrial automation, transportation, retail and more.
Responding to the surging demand for imaging processing, the powerful PICO317 has Intel® integrated Gfx graphic engine which optimizes the graphics performance and brings captivating visual experiences. This low-power industrial motherboard has a full-size PCI Express Mini Card slot supporting mSATA for wireless and storage. It has three USB 3.0 ports to connect with industrial cameras for machine vision applications.
“The PICO317 is a feature-rich, flexible and customizable pico-ITX form factor motherboard that is a great choice for many IIoT applications. Its fanless and ultra-compact design allows easy installation in environments and more flexible product designs. The varieties of I/O connectors are offered to deliver true customer value for fewer integration hassles,”
said Kevin Lin, a product manager of the Motherboard Division at Axiomtek.
The feature-rich PICO317 supports one DDR3L-1867 SO-DIMM slot with up to 8 GB of system memory. It is equipped with one Gigabit Ethernet port with Intel® i211AT which supports Wake-on-LAN and PXE Boot ROM. Other I/O interfaces include two RS-232 ports, two USB 2.0 ports, three USB 3.0 ports, one HD Codec audio and one SATA-600 slot. This stunning Pico-ITX board also has SMBus that is compatible with I2C for smart battery support. To meet the industrial needs, it has a 5VDC input with AT auto power-on function. Moreover, the PICO317 has a watchdog timer and offers hardware monitoring functions to detect CPU/system temperature and voltage to ensure reliable operation.
Advanced Features:
The PICO317 is now available for purchase. For more product information or customization services, please visit our global website at www.axiomtek.com or contact one of our sales representatives at info@axiomtek.com.tw.
InnoSenT’s radar is a highly precise distance measurement system for level determination and collision protection
InnoSenT’s iSYS-6030 radar system offers high-precision, focused distance measurement. The product is ideal for level measurement and collision avoidance. It enables reliable and exact distance detection even under extreme conditions such as heat, dust, or vibration. The radar collects data from different materials or physical states such as granules, powders, or liquids. It works even in challenging indoor and outdoor environments. The iSYS-6030 operates between 60 GHz to 64 GHz frequency. The sensor has a narrow antenna pattern with a concentrated beam for excellent measurement results. The detection range is up to 40 meters. The separation of two targets with the same radar cross-section is possible with a resolution of 12 cm. The field of view is very focused and precise with only 6° in azimuth and elevation. The radar system detects stationary and slowly moving targets and outputs the distance and signal strength in a target list. With the help of the non-contact distance measurement, it is possible, for example, to determine the fill level of container or the liquid gauge in a container. Alternatively, the distance measurement is used to prevent collisions of crane and large systems, as well as of semi-autonomous pallet or lift trucks and other means of transport.
The distance measurement is impressively accurate and reliable thanks to the achieved and a very low measurement error rate of only ±0.1% over range. The iSYS-6030 works within a temperature range of -40°C to +85°C. It has a fast update rate of 20 ms for continuous distance control and enables fast measuring cycles.
Important signal processing functions are already integrated into the system. For example, it is equipped with a processing unit to simplify the use of non-contact distance measurement for users. The radar provides information about distance and signal strength as a digital target list. The customer can use the product as a single target or multiple target detector.
The user can program and assign the four outputs individually. This opens additional setting options and the connection of extended control functions, so the output can be used as a trigger. Here is a practical example: the sensor indicates its start-up and is ready for measuring. Then, an appropriately programmed output can trigger a measurement. Afterward, the sensor switches off again. For easy configuration, the manufacturer provides a user manual and a GUI.
The successor iSYS-6030 radar system replaces the InnoSenT product iSYS-6003. Despite the same design, the product offers users additional advantages. This includes improved measurement accuracy, a stronger focused beam, a wider supply voltage range, faster measurement and cycle rates, and lower energy consumption.
The frequency band allows the product to be used within Europe, the USA, and China. The sensor has compact dimensions and is delivered with a radome. The technical features make the refurbished system the ideal radar solution for industrial applications and level measurement.
more information: www.innosent.de
Texas instruments introduced the TPS63900 DC/DC buck-boost converter; the company is calling it the industry’s first. It combines programmable input current limit and integrated dynamic voltage scaling to extend battery life.
The TPS63900 has a quiescent current of 75 nA with 92% efficiency at 10 µA.
Per a company release, TPS63900 integrates dynamic voltage scaling to deliver power while keeping the system at the minimum voltage required to operate efficiently, maximizing battery life and reducing required maintenance for industrial applications.
The features allows for optimization of power architectures for ultra-low power sensors and wireless connectivity integrated circuits.
The TPS63900 efficiently charges supercapacitors to buffer peak loads, protect battery capacity, and extend system lifetime and performance. By doing so, it helps buffer the energy that is required to operate components that are required for high peak currents.
Further, it increases stability of applications that are connected by reducing up to 50% of the output-voltage ripple caused by load transients. The transient response maintains low IQ, all while keeping internal regulation loop active.
For more information, visit https://www.ti.com/product/TPS63900?HQS=app-bmc-bcs-tps63900-pr-pf-null-wwe
SEGGER has just introduced a version of its J-Link software specifically for Linux Arm. Aimed at industrial automation and other applications utilizing Raspberry Pi and other single board computing platforms, this new package contains all command-line versions of the software. It supports the same target devices and the full feature set encompassed in the already-established Windows, macOS and Linux x86 versions. These features include high-speed download into Flash memory and an unlimited number of breakpoints (even in Flash memory), as well as a J-Link GDB server which makes it compatible with all popular development environments.
The software is available for both 32-bit and 64-bit Arm Linux, taking full advantage of the 64-bit CPU and all memory available in the system. It works on Raspberry Pi, as well as the various compatibles that are now on the market. The J-Link SDK also fully supports the writing of custom programs for J-Link on Arm Linux.
“Although it seems very unusual, even unlikely, it is now possible to use a small Raspberry Pi 4 single board computer with the Eclipse for Embedded C/C++ Developers package and the additional xPack binary tools, plus SEGGER’s J-Link debug probe and J-Link software, to create projects, build them and run debug sessions. Amazing!” says Liviu Ionescu, Developer of the Open-Source Eclipse Embedded CDT project.
“Raspberry Pi is gaining more and more popularity as a small, inexpensive yet powerful multi-purpose computing solution. While the typical use is automated test systems, with the Raspberry Pi acting as a J-Link bridge or server in the LAN/WLAN, there are many other applications. With Eclipse Embedded CDT coming, it is possible to use Raspberry Pi and J-Link as hardware to develop, download and debug firmware for embedded devices.” says Rolf Segger, founder of SEGGER.
About Raspberry Pi
Raspberry Pi was initially designed as an inexpensive way to introduce people to computers and programming, in schools and developing countries. SEGGER’s support for the Pi is in keeping with its philosophy of supporting students and hobbyists. Most of the SEGGER software tools are available at no cost for non-commercial usage under SEGGER’s Friendly License. SEGGER also offers educational versions of the popular J-Link Debug Probe. The J-Link EDU and J-Link EDU Mini are available for educational purposes at minimal cost.
For additional information please visit: www.segger.com
Panasonic’s new NCR18650BD-Improved is the latest evolution of its Li-ion cell – and can be considered as the result of the last years’ efforts to further evolutionize reliability, longevity and performance alongside the requirements of contemporary applications.
“Frankly spoken”, Norbert Depresles, Section Head of Business Development EMEA from Panasonic Industry Europe says,
“the NCR18650BD-Improved fits almost everywhere and demonstrates a proven performance stability over a wide range of discharge rate, temperature and cycle life.”
Nowadays, reliability doesn’t only comprise immaculate safety as a prerequisite, i.e. avoiding issues in terms of damage or even human risks. Reliability is also an economic factor – which is sustainably met by the NCR18650BD-Improved as endurance runner “without airs and graces”,
in particular, because there is no State of Health check (SOH) – an almost traditional restraint for Li-Ion cells – needed under certain charging conditions. By being charged at less stressful 4.15V from the start, this cell does not need the SOH check nor a reduction in the charging voltage. But even with 4.15V charging, the capacity of each cycle is higher and more stable in comparison to PF cells. It can be charged and discharged with high reliability and long life.
“On the meta-level, the NCR18650BD-Improved’s core feature is being unpretentious in every regard,” Mr. Depresles summarizes. “Having it reliably working in almost all environments and thus achieving cost reduction is what everyone needs. I’d even say, with the NCR18650BD-Improved, we have taken a crucial step towards the battery that ‘can be forgotten’ in the positive sense.”
more information: na.industrial.panasonic.com
Support High Speed Networking Capability Function & Certified Azure IoT
Aetina Corporation, the provider of high-performance GPGPU and edge AI computing solutions, announced the new AN810-XNX edge AI computer leveraging powerful capabilities of the NVIDIA® Jetson Xavier™ NX. This edge AI computer provided various alternatives of I/O slot, nicely expand its range of edge AI systems built on the Jetson platform for robotics, drone, UAV, industrial inspection, medical imaging, and deep learning.
The AN810-XNX combines the NVIDIA Jetson Xavier NX and Aetina brand new AN810 carrier board in a Nano-ITX form factor of 120x120x47.3 mm (with fan). It supports full M.2 slot with M-key, E-key, and B-key and the interface with PCIe/SATA/USB 3.2 Gen2/USB 2.0. AN810-XNX features prospective communication capabilities. Since 5G technology has become a sensation in IoT applications, AN810-XNX integrated with the 4G/5G module beforehand for high-speed wireless connection and data transferring. Meanwhile, AN810-XNX equipped an onboard SIM slot, building seamless global connectivity for edge devices. For better management of numerous edge devices, AN810-XNX supports the Innodisk InnoAGE™ out-of-band management SSD solution through M.2. With this solution, it reduces the massive cost of manually repairing the edge device and primarily minimizes the equipment’s downtime, making the remote-control of the edge device more convenient.
With the widespread use of vision AI application, AN810-XNX supports the single 120-pin connector for MIPI CSI-2 interface. It can handle intensive AI workloads ultra-high-resolution cameras to more accurate image analysis. For backup support, Aetina offers BSP and DTB configuration updates for both standard and customized platforms in their service policy.
Aetina focuses on delivering edge AI computing solutions based on the Jetson platform for embedded applications. NVIDIA Jetson benefits the users by supporting cloud-native technologies across AI solutions and various SDK. Moreover, Aetina AN810-XNX got Microsoft Azure Certified for Internet of Things (IoT), ensuring the IoT solutions could fasten development and work with Microsoft Azure IoT services.
“AIoT environment is diverse and complex. Throughout the edge AI systems, GPU-based platform has the most flexibility and Azure cloud services enhance the overall performance. Benefits the customer with shorter development period.” said Joe Lo, general manager of Aetina.
AN810-XNX, high compatibility platform with well-backup service from edge to cloud, could deploy high-quality, software-defined features on embedded and edge devices targeting robotics, drone, UAV, industrial IoT, healthcare, deep learning, etc.
The AN810-XNX is available now. For more information, please directly contact at sales@aetina.com or visit the website at www.aetina.com
SMART Modular Technologies has launched 16GB and 32GB NVDIMMs that operate on the DDR4-3200 high-speed bus rates. by Ally Winning @ eenewsembedded.com
The new devices combine Micron’s advanced DDR4 DRAM technology and SMART’s high-speed PCB designs. The combination of the two technologies significantly improves signal integrity, providing broader design margins even at the highest DDR4 bus speeds. NVDIMMs have seen broad adoption in applications that need “normal” memory operation at DRAM bus clock rates. SMART’s new NVDIMMs are also developed with Micron’s advanced 3D NAND technology to offer highly reliable memory persistence if the system crashes or there is a power outage, with minimal back-up and restore times.
“We are pleased that SMART is employing Micron’s DRAM and 3D NAND technologies in its newest leading-edge NVDIMM products to offer maximum reliability and performance,” stated Malcolm Humphrey, vice president of marketing of the Compute & Networking Business Unit at Micron. “Enterprises that need resilient memory and storage to ensure constant availability of mission-critical information will benefit from SMART’s NVDIMMs.”
The NVDIMMs operate much the same as DDR4 RDIMMs. They offer unlimited write endurance with integrated persistence capability. These traits create allow for efficient write acceleration and high-speed recovery capability. SMART NVDIMMs provide the full feature set currently defined by JEDEC standards. Additionally, AES-XTS 256 provides enhanced data protection. SMART also provides a wide variety of intelligent back-up power modules (BPM) in different form factors to provide temporary power during back-up operations.
SMART also offers full firmware and technical support to its customers for NVDIMM and BPM products. The company has a 10-year track record of designing, manufacturing and supporting NVDIMMs and BPMs. It has been a key contributor, along with other industry partners, in establishing the evolving NVDIMM ecosystem.
more information: www.smartm.com
The ACNT-H511C is a single-channel open collector optocoupler device in 15-mm stretched SO8 package
The ACNT-H511C is a single-channel open collector optocoupler device in 15-mm stretched SO8 package. The device is equipped with an insulating layer between the light-emitting diode and an integrated photon detector to provide electrical insulation between the input and output. Having separate connections for the photodiode bias and output transistor collector reduces the base-collector capacitance and enhances the data speed up to a hundred times compared to a conventional photo-transistor coupler.
more information: www.broadcom.com
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