Archives: Articles
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MIPS: Many Interesting Possibilities for Students
Trade schools and universities are two sides of the same educational coin. Broadly speaking, trade schools teach you how to work with your hands, while…
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The Changing Customizability Continuum
We spend a lot of time in the semiconductor business trying to put chips into bins. We in the press and those in the analyst…
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A Giant Sensor Standard
[Editor’s note: update appears at end.] What if I were to tell you that there was a standard in place – in fact, a relatively…
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Intel and Altera – Eleven-Figure Chicken
We’ve written a few times now about the rabidly rumored Intel bid to buy Altera. In fact, we actually predicted the whole thing almost a…
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Insights from the 3D Printing Conference and Expo
The exhibit floor at the Inside 3D Printing Conference and Expo in New York City is packed. While other tech conferences (like DAC and whatever…
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Choices On Top of Choices
“Embedded” has a new spelling, and it’s written IoT. Tensilica is a company that made its name as an early pioneer of tweak-it-yourself microprocessors. Actually,…
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Changing the PCB Axis
Anybody who has ever bought professional PCB software has probably noticed a problem with the way PCB tools have always been packaged, priced, and marketed.…
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3D Silicon Measurements
The 3D nature of aggressive silicon nodes continues to make life difficult for semiconductor equipment guys. Metrology is particularly troublesome, since seeing where edges lie…
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A Circuit Board for the Bees
This is a story about some of the finickiest customers you can imagine. It’s also a story of great patience. Let’s start with bees. Bees…
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A Case of Double Paranoia
“In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.” – Yogi Berra There’s theory, and then there’s practice. In theory,…