Use current-mirror biasing avoid squegging RF
Use current-mirror biasing to avoid squegging in RF oscillators
Apr 1, 2025 Circuits

If you've ever designed an RF oscillator, you've probably encountered squegging. Sometimes called "motor boating," squegging causes oscillators to start and stop at frequencies much lower than the frequency of interest...

100-MHz VFC TBH current pump
100-MHz VFC with TBH current pump
Mar 31, 2025 Circuits

Famous analog designer and author Jim Williams published an awesome design in 1986 for a 100-MHz voltage to frequency converter...

Why 45 degrees An overview loop
Why 45 degrees? An overview of loop stability in operational amplifiers
Mar 30, 2025 Articles

In operational amplifier stability, one rule of thumb is to allow 45 degrees of phase margin. Other design guidelines state that 60 degrees is best; still others say that 30 degrees is sufficient. These numbers are all attempts to ensure stable performance over a range of variables...

Active multiplexing saves inputs
Active multiplexing saves inputs
Mar 27, 2025 Articles

Microcontrollers must often read the status of switches in control applications. A typical switch configuration uses pullup resistors on both of the switches to pull the signals high or low for the microcontroller to read...

Spice models differential stripline
Spice models differential stripline
Mar 26, 2025 Articles

Differential signaling is a common technique for obtaining high noise immunity for critical signals in high-speed digital pc-board systems. The pc board's traces, carrying differential signals, are often edge-coupled offset striplines, with the traces sandwiched between two reference planes...

pitch-linear VCO. Part Taking it further
A pitch-linear VCO. Part 2 - Taking it further
Mar 25, 2025 Circuits

In this second part, we’ll look at some alternative ways of arranging things for other possible applications...

pitch-linear VCO. Part Getting it going
A pitch-linear VCO. Part 1 - Getting it going
Mar 24, 2025 Articles

An ongoing project (or gadget) called for a means of generating an audio output to represent a varying voltage level. Ho hum: that sounds like a voltage-controlled oscillator...

Peak power point
Peak power point
Mar 23, 2025 Articles

Imagine that you have a voltage source in series with some source resistance feeding power to a variable load. The relationship between load voltage, load current, and cell current can be drawn...

simple purely analog -130 dB THD
A simple, purely analog -130 dB THD sine wave generator
Mar 20, 2025 Circuits

The recent Design Idea “Getting an audio signal with a THD < 0.0002% made easy” discloses a low THD sine generator which led me to dust off a design...

TI introduces world smallest MCU enabling
TI introduces the world's smallest MCU, enabling innovation in the tiniest of applications
Mar 20, 2025 News

Texas Instruments introduced the world's smallest MCU, expanding its comprehensive Arm Cortex-M0+ MSPM0 MCU portfolio. Measuring only 1.38 mm2, about the size of a black pepper flake...