Printed Circuit Design & Fab Online Magazine - Design News

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SYDNEY, Australia – Altium Ltd. has released Altium Designer 6.6, which is said to include new features and enhancements aimed at unifying design flows beyond the development of the electronic circuitry in order to achieve greater end-to-end product development efficiency. In particular, it addresses the challenges of linking electronics design to mechanical design and product manufacture.

"Advances in technology are forcing the convergence of hardware, software and programmable hardware, and design systems must become unified at all levels to support this," said Nick Martin, founder and CEO, Altium Ltd. "Getting electronic products to market within an acceptable time frame requires not only effective collaboration between the electronics designers themselves, but also between electronics design and the rest of the stakeholders in the process. This is particularly important with mechanical design and manufacturing, where good data interchange can lead to significant time savings.”

Designer 6.6 expands the recently introduced STEP support (The ISO 10303 Standard for the Exchange of Product Model Data) to include direct import of 3D component data, helping designers access and share precise mechanical data to enhance the flow of information throughout the wider development lifecycle. Customers can now import 3D STEP models into PCB library files and associate them with components.

The software also features a new IPC footprint wizard, new adjustable rounded rectangular pad shapes, improved variant support, an improved drill drawing symbol table, an improved bill of material (BOM) report and a new signal integrity example.

CARSON CITY, NV – Taiyo America Inc. has released LDI-1000 GA, a new laser direct imageable solder mask. It is said to be a high productivity solder mask designed specifically for LDI applications and requiring only 80 mJ/cm² of exposure energy. It resolves fine features in coatings up to 65 microns in thickness.

LDI-1000 GA is reported to have excellent heat resistance, and is compatible with lead-free assembly. It also is RoHS compliant, meets industry standards for low halogen and is compatible with final finishes including electroless nickel/immersion gold, silver and tin.

“LDI-1000 GA is a state of the art product for the most demanding designs that require laser direct imaging. It utilizes conventional solder mask equipment for coating and processing after laser exposure to minimize modifications to the conventional solder mask process in the shop,” says Jody Williams, New Product Development manager for Taiyo America.

CARSON CITY, NV – Taiyo America Inc. has introduced a new, single-part, thermally cured epoxy hole plugging ink, THP-100DX1. This hole plugging ink is platable and is said to have excellent thermal properties. THP-100DX1 is available in standard bulk packaging and in pre-filled cartridges to fit mass automated hole-plugging machines.

“THP-100DX1 was formulated as a high Tg, low CTE material for high performance applications. Packaging in cartridges to fit the MASS hole plugging equipment brings the additional advantages of convenience and improved productivity for these users,” says Jody Williams, manager of New Product Development for Taiyo America.

DNEPROPETROVSK, Ukraine – Novarm Ltd. has launched DipTrace 1.30, which is bundled with four of Novarm's front-end modules: schematic, PCB layout, pattern editor and component editor.

Among the software’s new features are improved color settings, part rotation by a desired angle, static vias placement, Electra autorouter support and enhanced manual routing tools.

With DipTrace 1.30 you can select a white or black background for your design area, or create your own preference templates. User-defined additional fields are now available in the pattern and component editors. A series of hotkeys have been added, and static vias are available as well. This new version has a new lock/unlock feature and includes netlist support of widely used formats.

MARLBOROUGH, MA – DownStream Technologies LLC announced a new configuration and price structure for their PCB documentation product, BluePrint for PCBs. Named BluePrint Foundations, it is built from the same core technology as BluePrint-PCB, allowing users to quickly create comprehensive, electronic PCB fabrication and assembly instructions. It is more closely aligned in price to appeal to PCB designers who currently use PADS, OrCAD and CADStar PCB layout products.

“The market demand for BluePrint has so far surpassed our wildest expectations,” said Rick Almeida, a founder of DownStream Technologies. “BluePrint Foundations will allow us to further expand the market by providing a solution to PCB layout designers who may be on a more restricted budget but still require comprehensive documentation to build their products.”

BluePrint Foundations is 100% compatible with BluePrint-PCB and allows users to mix and match configurations to meet their needs. Reported features include unlimited PCB views, hyperlinking, automatic ECO updates, full word processing with spell check, exotic file importation and Web publisher.

AUSTIN, TX – 3M has a new polyimide film tape designed for high-temperature applications requiring a tough, thin backing that resists solvents.

3M polyimide film tape 1218 is UL recognized for use at temperatures up to 130˚C (formerly known as Class H). Unlike most such tapes, the new 3M polyimide film tape has an acrylic pressure-sensitive adhesive.

It can be used as insulation on coils, transformers, capacitors and wire harnesses, and also as a cover layer material for many types of flexible printed circuits.

3M polyimide film tape 1218 is available in standard and custom widths on a 3-inch polyester core. The standard length is 33 meters.