Electronicstalk newsletter issue 293

The week's top stories from Electronicstalk

Written by the Electronicstalk editor Nov 14, 2006

You'll have to excuse me this week for addressing an area that is really rather more "media" than "technology", but I have to applaud last week's (fairly well reported) survey from market research company Akamai - www.akamai.com - that came up with the unsurprising statistic that (on average) the majority of Internet users lost patience with any website that took more than four seconds to load.

As one who has been advising companies for some years on website design - and advocating the "low-bandwidth" school of homepage design - I personally welcome any such endorsement. Indeed, one of our main design criteria here at Pro-talk has been to provide a service that can be accessed with minimal bandwidth in a reasonable timeframe. And I can testify that earlier this year when I was stuck with dial-up access for a few weeks, the Electronicstalk homepage loaded as quickly as any.

However, the message does not seem to have been universally received.

Even today when (for the sake of argument) the default bandwidth might be considered to be 256Kbit/s (and I can think of may corporate users who would get extremely excited if they ever got that much share of their company's web access) there are too many sites in our own (supposedly tech-savvy) sector that demand every visitor downloads so much "baggage" before viewing even the homepage that the "four-second rule" is regularly invoked.

From a personal standpoint, I do have to consider whether it is worth Electronicstalk carrying links to such sites. (And I do visit all our linked sites to check this very point).

However, recent developments have perhaps put slightly different spin on the whole subject. One aspect that the Akamai survey (and indeed web users) cannot take into account is loss of bandwidth that can be attributed to malicious attacks - be they spam or anything more nefarious - to which (most) sites are subject every day.

As my whole working regime is based around high-speed access to a specific server, I can testify that such attacks are rife (and seemingly random). Point-to-point bandwidth can disappear in the bat of an eyelid - to return minutes later - and it doesn't necessarily mean that the server I want is the one under attack.

So perhaps we are all being a little unfair. Four seconds may well be about right for "pulling the plug" on a website. But maybe we should check back again in a few minutes to see whether the situation has improved!

Top Products featured this issue

[1] PC OSCILLOSCOPE DOESN'T COMPROMISE ITS SPECS

(Pico Technology, 14 Nov 2006)

Pico Technology has unveiled the PicoScope 5204, a dual-channel PC oscilloscope with a bandwidth of 250MHz, a memory depth of 128 million samples and a real-time sampling rate of 1Gsample/s. All other oscilloscopes in this price range force you to compromise on one of the three key specifications: sampling rate, bandwidth or memory depth. The PicoScope 5204 excels in all three of these areas, making it a no compromise oscilloscope at a price every engineer can afford. The PicoScope 5204 connects to the USB port of any Windows laptop or desktop PC and offers an array of high-end oscilloscope features, including advanced triggering and an equivalent-time sampling mode that can boost the sampling rate to 20Gsample/s for repetitive waveforms.

[2] DUAL-CORE MCU MEETS TOP AUTOMOTIVE SAFETY STANDARD

(Texas Instruments (April 2006-), 08 Nov 2006)

Accelerating the trend towards safer, but less complex automotive chassis control applications, Texas Instruments has introduced a new symmetrical dual-core microcontroller (MCU). The TMS570 MCU is the first automotive processor solution to support a certification according to the IEC61508 SIL3 standard - the highest level of safety that is designated for automotive applications. Codeveloped with Robert Bosch, a leading global supplier of automotive technology, the TMS570 MCU will be implemented in next generation braking, steering and chassis control applications. The TMS570 MCU platform uses two identical ARM Cortex R4 cores combined with an initial 2Mbyte of on-chip Flash memory.

[3] FPGAS RAISE PERFORMANCE BUT CUT POWER

(Altera Europe, 10 Nov 2006)

Altera Corp has announced its Stratix III FPGA family, claimed to deliver the industry's lowest power consumption of any high-density, high-performance programmable logic device. Built on TSMC's 65nm process, Stratix III FPGAs feature groundbreaking innovations including hardware architecture advancements and Quartus II software enhancements. Working together, these new features deliver 50% lower power, 25% higher performance and 2x the density compared with previous generation Stratix II devices.

[4] MICROWAVE SIMULATOR HAS FLEXIBLE INPUTS

(Flomerics, 09 Nov 2006)

Flomerics has introduced version 7.5 of its MicroStripes 3D EM simulation solution for RF/microwave and antenna design which integrates with Applied Wave Research's (AWR) Microwave Office circuit design software. The new version of MicroStripes enables users to import any desired excitation waveform during the modelling process, run the simulation, and evaluate the results without any additional postprocessing. This makes it possible, for example, to simulate the effect of a lightning strike, electromagnetic pulse (EMP) or electrostatic discharge (ESD) on a system using a precomputed, analytic or measured waveform.

[5] CABLES CARRY HIGH-DEFINITION MULTIMEDIA

(GTK, 10 Nov 2006)

HDMI cables are now available from connector and cable assembly specialist GTK. HDMI technology integrates all video and sound signals onto a single, thin cable, making it easy to connect components together. In addition, everything on an HDMI cable assembly remains in its original, uncompressed digital format: signals are no longer converted from digital to analogue (in order to run through the cables) and then back to digital. HDMI also supports standard, enhanced or high definition video at 24bit/pixel, 165MHz maximum clock frequency, as well as bidirectional control signal transfer.

[6] FIBRE-OPTIC TRANSCEIVERS ADOPT M12 FORM FACTOR

(Harting, 14 Nov 2006)

The new M12 microFX from Harting is a family of active fibre-optic transceivers with the same dimensions as the industry standard M12 electrical connector, making it ideally suited to use in industrial Ethernet and other industrial data-transmission applications. The Harting microFX range consists of active transceivers with diagnostic function for optical data transmission at speeds of up to 125Mbit/s, as well as the corresponding connectors for single- and multimode glass fibre and plastic fibre. In addition to two optical contacts for data transmission, each device incorporates two electrical contacts for power-supply use.

[7] SYSTEM SPEEDS PCB TEST THROUGHPUT

(Seica, 13 Nov 2006)

Seica will present a new addition to its line of flying probe test systems at Electronica (Stand A1.459) to address the growing demand to provide cost-effective test solutions that will further enhance ease of programming, high fault coverage and fast throughput for PCB test. Aerial is based on the core hardware and software of the Viva Integrated Platform (VIP) and uses four completely independent, mobile test probes to carry out tests on both sides of the board under test (two on each side). It is particularly indicated for testing prototypes, samples, small and medium series, providing maximum flexibility of use to reduce the time and costs of board development.

[8] LOW-COST PACKAGE OFFERS COMPLETE ARM EVALUATION

(Computer Solutions, 10 Nov 2006)

A complete low-cost development package for the NXP (Philips) LPC range of ARM processors, consisting of an evaluation and experimental board, a GCC compiler, a JTAG interface, an IDE and debugger, as well as a host of application examples, is now available from Computer Solutions. These kits have everything an engineer needs to get started on developing ARM code as soon as the board is plugged in and the software is installed on the disk. The Embest LPCEB2000 range of evaluation board kits are available in versions for the LPC2114/19/24/29/94, 2131/32/38 and 2210/12/14/90/92/94, the device type being determined by the selection of a daughter board.

[9] COMMON-MODE FILTER CLEANS UP DIFFERENTIAL LINES

(TDK Electronics Europe, 14 Nov 2006)

New from TDK Corp, the TCM1210 common mode filter ensures excellent quality of transmission for devices using differential signals. Thanks to the wide bandwidth (cutoff frequency of 3GHz) for differential mode, the filter suppresses the radiated emission that causes interference noise but has almost no effect on high-speed differential signals. This means engineers can be assured of excellent quality in high-speed transmission of signals for communication applications such as USB.

[10] SECURE IP CONTROLLER AT THE POINT OF SALE

(Connect One, 10 Nov 2006)

Connect One has scheduled January 2007 for the release of the iChipSec CO2128, a secure Internet Protocol (IP) communication controller chip that reduces the cost and speeds the design of new IP-enabled point-of-sale (POS) terminals. The chip also includes many hardware enhancements that ensure high-throughput by offloading IP and network security protocols from the host processor. With over 1000,000 iChips deployed in more than 50 countries - many of them installed in POS terminals - POS terminal manufacturers can eliminate the learning curve for deploying reliable IP-enabled terminals with CO2128.

This week's industry news

MOSCOW OFFICE TO LEAD RUSSIAN OFFENSIVE
(Texas Instruments (April 2006-), 14 Nov 2006)
Texas Instruments is providing new levels of support to Russian-speaking markets to extend its local customer service.

PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT CENTRE OPENS IN BRATISLAVA
(ON Semiconductor, 13 Nov 2006)
ON Semiconductor has officially opened the doors of its new product development centre in Bratislava, Slovakia.

AUTOMOTIVE INITIATIVE BEARS FRUIT FOR MELEXIS
(Melexis, 10 Nov 2006)
Melexis has reported results for the third quarter of 2006, with revenues up 16% on the same quarter in 2005.

BLUETOOTH DOMINANCE CONTINUES
(Cambridge Silicon Radio, 09 Nov 2006)
CSR has announced its unaudited financial results for the third quarter of 2006, reporting strong growth in quarterly revenues and operating profit.

LIVE SOFTWARE EVALUATION GOES ONLINE
(Sysgo, 10 Nov 2006)
Sysgo is now offering potential customers the chance to experience its products live from anywhere in the world.

RECORD QUARTER FOR LYRTECH
(Lyrtech, 13 Nov 2006)
Lyrtech has published its financial results for the third quarter ended 30th September 2006.

VALOR EYES ASIAN EXPANSION
(Valor Computerized Systems, 10 Nov 2006)
Valor Computerised Systems has announced its financial results for the nine-month period ending 30th September 2006.

SALES GROWTH CONTINUES FOR TOWER
(Tower Semiconductor, 08 Nov 2006)
Tower Semiconductor has announced its third quarter 2006 results.

MICROELECTRONICS INSTITUTE CELEBRATES A DECADE
(National Microelectronics Institute, 14 Nov 2006)
The National Microelectronics Institute, the trade association representing the semiconductor industry in the UK and Ireland, has celebrated its 10th birthday.

ACQUISITION BRINGS LASER SOURCES TOGETHER
(Photonic Products, 08 Nov 2006)
Photonic Products has been acquired by StockerYale.

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Dave Wilson

Electronicstalk editor

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