Questions tagged [testing]

Proving the proper operation or finding faults in an electrical device. It can be done using electronic test equipment or by a software-based simulation.

622 questions
36
votes
5 answers

Testpoints: Vias versus pads

I was fixing an ultra cheap home router few days ago and noticed that it had vias marked TP_12V, TP_3V3, TP_GND and similar. The problem turned out to be leaky electrolytic crapacitors in the buck converter and the vias really helped debugging that,…
AndrejaKo
  • 24,074
  • 30
  • 117
  • 194
30
votes
3 answers

FCC and CE Testing / Failure Resolution

I'm seriously thinking about (practically committed to) taking one of my products through FCC and EC testing and it's my first time doing so. It's Arduino based electronics running off a 16MHz crystal with an Ethernet Controller running off a 25MHz…
vicatcu
  • 23,205
  • 17
  • 88
  • 163
24
votes
14 answers

What can I put a kilowatt into? (Or: help me save my hairdryers)

TL;DR: I need something to discharge roughly 160A at 14V into, or 2.24 kilowatts. Any comments, or answers, with either a) something I can dump a kilowatt into, b) some way I can modify a common item to take 2kW DC at 160A, or c) another way to…
Owen Versteeg
  • 371
  • 3
  • 8
22
votes
5 answers

How can we test the lifespan of electrical components?

We work with some electronic devices in our projects. We are at the stage where we need to create some test strategy to validate the lifespan (e.g. 1 to 5 years) of our devices for which we provide warranty. We need to standardize this test strategy…
MKSJ
  • 229
  • 2
  • 5
21
votes
4 answers

Electronics System Standards Compliance: Certification, Testing & Verification

Please note: this question has to do with the technical compliance aspects of the consumer electronics indsutry, and as such, I believe is within scope for this site. This question is about compliance, and Compliance is absolutely a qualitative…
smeeb
  • 807
  • 3
  • 15
  • 34
20
votes
3 answers

What is Full form of hFE of a digital multimeter?

In digital multimeter, there is a transistor-check function, and there is a term hFE. I do-not know how-to use-it, however, different Websites say it is a measurement transistor's gain ("the ratio of the Ic/Ib") such as:…
user107801
19
votes
1 answer

Soft-CPU verification

I'm currently in the process of designing a simple CPU in VHDL using Xilinx ISE and ISIM. The design portion is going remarkably well, but I can't seem to figure out a way to do verification in a consistent manner. Right now I have a VHDL test bench…
drxzcl
  • 3,830
  • 3
  • 34
  • 34
18
votes
1 answer

How do you test condoms electronically?

Condom packages often say "electronically tested". How can you test a condom electronically?
Johan.A
  • 1,826
  • 1
  • 16
  • 27
17
votes
6 answers

Any tricks to attaching a wire or pin to a testpoint?

More and more often, I find myself needing to tear apart a device to seek out and connect to serial pads. These pads typically give me access to the underlying operating system for research or tinkering, of which I'm perfectly comfortable with. What…
Rafael Rivera
  • 273
  • 1
  • 2
  • 6
17
votes
6 answers

What unit test framework can I use for a c based mcu project?

I'm thinking about how I can use unit tests in my mcu project, and what frameworks I can use to simplify it. Today I am using a stm32 with OpenOCD-jtag from a Linux pc, where it is all controlled from a classic Makefile and crosscompiled with gcc. I…
Johan
  • 2,395
  • 2
  • 25
  • 27
16
votes
3 answers

Puff of smoke in air. 3 different PCBs. PCB has ghosts?

Yes, that is a haiku. (EDIT: fixed it... it is now actually a Haiku) No I'm not smiling. I'm doing some standard testing; seeing what happens when one of the two power rails gets shorted to GND on a PCB that I designed. We're talking about a 12 V…
macdonaldtomw
  • 1,430
  • 1
  • 17
  • 33
16
votes
1 answer

Does anybody have any idea what this piece of equipment is?

A friend of mine picked this up at a garage sale where an elderly electrical engineer was selling a bunch of old test equipment. It's missing a faceplate where it should name what it is, and he's googled the company name and model number, all to no…
TehBam
  • 161
  • 3
16
votes
8 answers

What is the difference between testing and verification?

Every textbook I've seen makes a big deal of the fact that testing and verification are two different concepts. Yet none of them provides a clear (or clear enough to me, at last) distinction. To provide some context, I'm interested in the…
VHDL Addict
  • 161
  • 1
  • 1
  • 5
14
votes
1 answer

Amateur radio practice exam question about voltage drop

So the question is as follows: "Your mobile HF transceiver draws 22 amperes on transmit. The manufacturer suggester limiting voltage drop to 0.5 volt and the vehicle battery is 3 metres(10 feet) away. Given the losses below at that current, which…
Mohammad Ali
  • 323
  • 1
  • 2
  • 8
14
votes
4 answers

How to test a crystal resonator in board?

I have 2 quartz crystal resonators in my pcb board: 32.768 kHz & 20 MHz. They are connected to a Freescale MC12311 transceiver IC, which has an HCS08 micro-controller embedded in it. I want to test if these crystals are working properly or not.…
Omid1989
  • 285
  • 1
  • 3
  • 12
1
2 3
…
41 42