I read a book about the history of electronics recently. What fascinated me was that after ICs got started, the race was on to emulate every thinkable electric component using ICs: relay (that's the transistor), resistor, capacitors, impedance and we are still not finished: antennas, all kinds of sensors. As somebody else mentioned on SN, we are on our way to the tricoder - in the end it will be an implantable IC.
I did an interview once where they quizzed me on miniaturization and low-costing of various circuits. We came to the inductor as one of the remaining hard-cases to make small and cheap - there are some printed circuit methods to get limited inductance with multi-layer processes, but if you need a really stout L value (not just inductance-like behavior in a transfer function) you still need a real coil.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 28 2018, @05:47AM
by Anonymous Coward
on Wednesday November 28 2018, @05:47AM (#767219)
Same applies to capacitors. You can get small values on die, but nothing huge. Inductors are the same, you can get small values on die, but nothing huge. By huge, I'm talking about useful values for power handling purposes.
(Score: 1) by shrewdsheep on Wednesday November 21 2018, @04:26PM (2 children)
I read a book about the history of electronics recently. What fascinated me was that after ICs got started, the race was on to emulate every thinkable electric component using ICs: relay (that's the transistor), resistor, capacitors, impedance and we are still not finished: antennas, all kinds of sensors. As somebody else mentioned on SN, we are on our way to the tricoder - in the end it will be an implantable IC.
Therefore, my vote went wholeheartedly for IC.
(Score: 4, Informative) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday November 21 2018, @07:09PM (1 child)
I did an interview once where they quizzed me on miniaturization and low-costing of various circuits. We came to the inductor as one of the remaining hard-cases to make small and cheap - there are some printed circuit methods to get limited inductance with multi-layer processes, but if you need a really stout L value (not just inductance-like behavior in a transfer function) you still need a real coil.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 28 2018, @05:47AM
Same applies to capacitors. You can get small values on die, but nothing huge. Inductors are the same, you can get small values on die, but nothing huge. By huge, I'm talking about useful values for power handling purposes.