Page 64 - The Art and Science of Analog Circuit Design

Gregory T. A, Kovacs

simulated power consumption validation of a subset of indirect-jump
instructions of the new Valium computer chip at Interola's new lab
in Lumbago, Oregon.
Love,
Billy

What Should Aspiring Analog Designers Read?

There is good stuff on analog circuits to read out there, and generally it is
reasonably easy to locate. I am not going to go into the large number of
books available other than to point out that you really need to have
Horowitz and Hill, The Art of Electronics (Cambridge Press) and Gray
and Meyer, Analysis and Design of Analog Integrated Circuits (John
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Wiley and Sons). Those two books are simply the essentials; it's easy to
supplement them from the droves of texts out there.
As far as journals go, there are several good ones out there. Of course,
the IEEE has a few. Then there's Wireless World, put out by a bunch of
hackers in the United Kingdom, with real depth mixed right in there with
fan projects. Another good foreign offering is Elektor, which is put out
by a bunch of hackers in Holland (the closed-loop cheese fondue con-
troller project last year was awesome). The Computer Applications
Journal (alias Circuit Sewer) is worth reading, but is aimed at those who
think debugging a piece of hardware involves mainly fixing software (it
is 90% digital subject matter, with occasional forays into scary things
like op amps). What about those old standards like Popular Electronics!
Well, they are OK for the occasional project idea, but as for technical
content, I generally say, "Later!" (especially to ones with names like
Electronics Now!).
One of the richest sources of information, and probably the least obvi-
ous to beginners, is the application notes written by the manufacturers of
integrated circuits. Just think about it... they are trying to sell their
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wares by getting you excited about their uses. They are absolutely
packed with interesting circuits! Usually, you can get them for free, as
well as sets of data books, just by calling the manufacturers. Saying you
are a student usually helps, and will often get you free samples too. In
case you don't know, the best ones are from National Semiconductor,
Linear Technology, Maxim, Analog Devices, and Burr Brown.

1 i. Did I mention that this book is also one of the essentials? In any case, you are already clever
enough to be reading it, so why bother!
12. They have to accomplish this by showing you cool circuits you can build, as opposed to tradi-
tional marketing approaches, such as those used to sell beer. I am still waiting for the Swedish
Bipolar Bikini Team, though!

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