EMI Bites: Don't fall for these common EMC/EMI myths that are holding your PCB design back.
EMI Bites: Don't fall for these common EMC/EMI myths that are holding your PCB design back.
I kept struggling to understand EMC/EMI until I realized I was solving for the wrong problem.
I kept thinking that it was incredibly complex to understand the relationship between EMC emission test failures, and the source of the problem.
I couldn't understand how my design was generating this interference.
Where was it coming from?
How was it possible that my circuits were creating emissions?
The main reason I wasn't seeing the connection was that I was picturing signal propagation in the wrong way.
I thought that what they taught us at university was the right way to think about electric circuits.
Only later did I realize that what I had learned was not the complete story, but only a simplification of what was really going on.
The truth is that these simplified concepts no longer worked when applied to reality.
Too many mismatches, too many wrong assumptions, and too many misleading analogies.
This is what led me to go deeper and discover that the way we have been taught about circuits is merely the tip of the iceberg, and that these models struggle to apply to today's technologies.
Once I revised and refined my understanding of the fundamental principles, everything started to click, and EMC/EMI became much easier to understand.
It's like trying to drink water with a fork - it looks almost impossible, but in fact you are simply using the wrong tools.
Quick tip: EMI is about guiding and containing energy flow, not about the movement of electrons.
Hope this helps you.
To electromagnetic enlightenment,
Dario
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