Universal Smd:To-Dil Adaptors

An increasing number of electronic components, and in particular inte- grated circuits, is now only available as surface-mount devices (SMDs). Circuit design on the basis of these leadless, tiny, components invariably poses prob- lems to many because there is no way to go round making a printed circuit board for building and testing prototypes. Making PCBs for SMD based designs is cumbersome and time-consuming. In many cases it will, therefore, be desirable to develop the circuit as it would have been done using ICs and components of standard size. The PCB adaptors introduced here make this possible. With the exception of the general-purpose type, they are slightly larger than ICs of normal size, but still fit in the generally adopted 0.1 in. raster. The adaptor PCBs effectively enable a range of SMD ICs to be handled just as their normal-size equivalents, and so alleviate the plight of designing and et- ching a new PCB for every experiment or minor change to the circuit. SMD ICs ...