Altium

Envision – what's new, changing and over the horizon     Welcome to the December 2009 issue of Envision, our regularly updated collection of insights, news and views from Altium. In this update you can read about an easy way to flesh out your design ideas from a user’s standpoint, find out about the design management approach of company that creates board designs for high profile NASA projects and learn how the new NanoBoard 3000 can become a boots and all lighting controller – plus a whole lot more.       Prototype ideas, not details     When comes down to it, an electronic product design is the painstaking manifestation of a collection of ideas. But they’re a callous lot, product users – they don’t care. What they do care about is how it functions and the experience of interacting with that product. As a designer, this is the place to start. Read the full story       Managing the lingua franca of electronics design     In an exclusive interview with Darya Bronston, President of PCB design specialist DKB Resources, she explains how her company manages the complex process of developing board assemblies that meet the extreme standards required for applications such as NASA’s Mars Rovers and the forthcoming Curiosity Rover. Read the full story       Gauging NASCAR     Extreme temperatures, harsh vibration and complex physical constraints – the only environment more challenging to design electronics for is space…. maybe. Design consultants Electronic Design Solutions took on those challenges when developing the high-tech microelectronics for a new breed of precision gauges for NASCAR race cars. Read the full story       Free Webinar: Solving Mechanical Challenges in a 3D PCB Environment   Don’t waste your time with paper cut-outs and inaccurate mechanical mock-ups. True 3D PCB design is here today and you can benefit from it immediately. See for yourself just how easy it is to unify ECAD and MCAD design processes around common design files and use the power of 3D to get designs right first time. Live on December 9 – register now!     What are we doing, right now?   See what’s happening at Altium, in real-time. Follow us on twitter to find out about the latest news, events, videos and design tutorials. There’s so much going on, can we actually condense it to 140 characters or less?

DECEMBER TECH TIP Controller applications using the NanoBoard Altium’s NanoBoard 3000 is suitable for a huge range of tasks including industrial control applications. It’s also a perfect platform for developing lighting controller applications. In the first of a two part tech tip we’ll present a short overview of the DMX-512 lighting protocol and how to enable the NanoBoard in this domain.   One less board to design for prototypes Altium’s NanoBoards are fitted with a range useful peripherals, but for some design projects you’ll need to create your own specialized peripheral board. That’s now even easier with the availability of Altium’s clever peripheral prototyping board, which is ready to take your custom peripheral hardware design. Another barrier to rapid deployment tumbles. (PDF)   New service pack now available In line with Altium’s commitment to providing regular software updates and enhancements, Service Pack 1 for the Summer 09 release of Altium Designer is now available. Read the details of the update here.   Meet the Envision team There are real people behind the creation of Envision, and we've stopped hiding.

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