Electro-ramblings

Yesterday I went to an interesting AMD briefing but I can't reveal its content, for a while, because all the journalists present had to sign a non disclosure agreement (NDA)...

We are updating the Products section of Electronics Weekly.com on a daily basis. Remember, you don't need to wait for the magazine to get the latest announcements - just check out www.electronicsweekly.com/products

Just to remind you, here are the latest five products posted, covering LED drivers, GaAs MMIC receivers and forms software...

Hats off to David Manners - its five hundred and counting for the blog that started a year ago, in the week of Electronica. It's the distinctive, entertaining, authoritative and never dull commentary on the semiconductor industry, from someone who knows.

Monday sees the launch of Intel's 45nm Penryn processor family, including a first Core 2 Extreme quad-core processor.

According to Intel, back in its IDF Fall 2007, the Core 2 Extreme QX9650 will feature a massive 12MB of L2 Cache, and run at a frequency of 3GHz. It will be Intel's new big beast of the jungle.

One for SOC designers. Check out a new in-depth feature that has just been posted on Electronics Weekly.com - Traffic management: A growing nightmare for SOC designers

There's a new column in town. Warren Savage's column on semiconductors and intellectual property has now begun - check out the first instalment Warren Savage On: Making the Case for Invented Here

Just been posting an entry into our Products section - the Anritsu MF2400C microwave frequency counter, as it happens.

Just updated the homepage to highlight an interesting in-depth look at digitally managed power circuits.

Power ICs that combine analogue and digital are becoming more common, writes Terry Cleveland, from our sister-site EDN. And among other points, he considers the important decision of where to partition the analogue and digital boundaries...

The feature begins:

"Battery-charger applications have increased the need for digital functions, but high frequency and cost have limited the practicality of closed-loop, purely digital systems. Combining both analog and digital control of the power-conversion feedback loop can help designers achieve the best of both the analog and the digital worlds.

One week after Intel launches its 45nm Penryn processor, AMD unveils its 65nm Phenom desktop chips - the centrepiece of its new Spider platform, bidding to take HD video mainstream.

The Phenom chips represent the centrepiece of its "Spider" multimedia desktop platform. In the wake of Intel's success with a platform approach to computing - think of the Centrino trinity of processor, chipset and network comms - AMD is following a similar strategy.

If, like me, you enjoy reading the short sharp Q5 interviews in Electronics Weekly, take note - we have brought them all together in one easily searched Q5 Index.

From ARM's chairman, Sir Robin Saxby (pictured), to touchscreen technology firm Zytronic's MD, Mark Cambridge, the business leaders share their particular insights on the UK electronics industry.

Have just loaded two features onto the site - Why design engineers need to know about lithography, part 1 and
part 2. Check out this tracing of the topography of lithography, as it were.

Part one considers how semiconductor manufacturers have moved to lasers with ever smaller wavelengths (from 436 nm in 1980, to 365 nm in 1988, to 350 nm in 1994, to 248 nm in 1998 and finally to 193 nm in 2001) up to the 248-nm generation of lithography tools, when people began patterning below the wavelength of the light source.

Have you signed up to receive the Circuits and Made by Monkeys newsletters yet? Or the Weekly editorial email? Go to MyAccount to make sure you receive them.

During their launch period, ElectronicsWeekly.com was offering Circuits and Made by Monkeys to all our readers, but this has come to a close. So if you wish to keep receiving the newsletters you will need to register!

It's that time again for the periodic browser question: how fare the armies on the battlefield of cyberspace? How does Firefox compare to Internet Explorer when it comes to readers of ElectronicsWeekly.com? How is the battle faring on our particular piece of electronics turf?

The stats for the last month are:

Gary Nevison - our resident blogger on environmental legislation and government directives - has reached 50. Fifty blog posts, that is - read the 50th post

From Arsenic and batteries to WEEE and the Xbox, Gary covers the ground. These topics are taken from the blog's tag-cloud, by the way, where RoHS and the EU also stand prominently.

One of the advantages of being a Web editor at Reed is that each year you are treated to an Editors' Conference to highlight the latest trends and issues in publishing. Such is the case this Friday

Wotton House, Dorking, is the location, and I for one am looking forward to it. Topics covered will include the value of different types of user generated content, the future of journalism, editorial tools and workflow, email newsletters and using video...