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The CAFE Standard for RF, Microwave, Wireless, Radar, Satellite, & Analog Engineering

Each month, the winner can choose from a list of my engineering books and other items. Brian A. was the February winner. Click on icon for details. New titles from Artech House added in March.

Smorgasbord

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A Backwards Extension
of Moore's Law
source: (Intel)

Assuming the data used is accurate, this chart indicates that Moore's Law describing (not governing) IC evolution, when applied to computing efficiency, reaches back to the first digital computer - ENIAC. A study titled, "Assessing Trends in the Electrical Efficiency of Computation Over Time" found that when computing power as a function of electrical power usage is plotted, it doubles approximately every 18 months. Engineers expect the trend to continue. If the chart had resembled a hockey stick, I would have dismissed it as junk science.

Featured Book

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RFID-Enabled Sensor Design and Applications
by Rida & Tentzeris
Artech House

Cool Pic

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It was 50 years ago that the first laser was demonstrated at Bell Labs. Here is a brief photo history of the development, beginning with masers and ending with semiconductor lasers. Low-cost, high efficiency red, green, and blue semi lasers are highly desired by display makers for high definition large screen TVs. Red came first by using GaAs compounds and then blue by using GaN. Green has been not so easy. Achieving the holy grail of 520 nm, where true "green" begins, was achieved just last year - hard to believe, huh? Read all about it in IEEE's Spectrum.

Reciprocal Links

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Click here to see the full-page advertisement that I did NOT insult you with before presenting what you came here for.

Cool Product

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ISEE has developed a compact, low-cost, robust 24 GHz radar sensor (ISM Band included) for automotive, industrial or home applications. Consisting of a planar antenna, a 24 GHz front-end and an OMAP3530 processor unit for signal processing, it measures distances (25 m ±20 mm typical), velocity or properties of objects with

high accuracy. The system uses a linear FM CW signal. Lunar Lander X-Prize contestants were all begging for something like this a couple years ago (I know because I received many e-mails looking for such a product). Price is only 145€ ($200).

Notable Quote

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"Microsoft suggesting that some tax be instituted to fund fixing malware problems would be like Toyota suggesting an additional gasoline tax to fund their recent recalls" - Slashdot blogger yagu.

Videos for Engineers

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I have to admit to never having heard of this band, OK Go. They and a cast of many created a pretty amazing, giant size Rube Goldberg machine.
One of my favorite parts is the bowling ball being launched across a fairly large distance and hitting its target to continue the machine's repertoire of imaginative gizmos. The video is nearly 4 minutes long.

Press Releases

2010 Archive

Harsh Environment Packaging Available from Empower RF Systems

RFHIC Introduces High Efficiency GaN Pallet Amp

Z-Comm Introduces Fixed Frequency L-Band Synthesizer: SFS1720A-LF

KR Electronics Introduces 115 MHz Bandpass Filter

Hittite Launches New Ultra-Compact Tunable Filter Product Line!

Connector City Announces Reverse Polarity MMCX Connector Series

Microphase Introduces New K, Ka Band Bandpass Filter

Narda 20-dB Bidirectional Coaxial Attenuator Operates to 4 GHz

AWR Kicks Off “High-Frequency Design Success” Tour in Asia-Pacific Region

American Standard Circuits Achieves ISO9001:2008 Certification