Power Supply Resevoir Size

[gootee]

Lots of downloads of the PDF file but almost no feedback on that, either. Sigh.

[KSTR]

Tom, I'll happily use your tools when time is due.

ATM I'm too busy with my new toy, a network analyzer, which allows to delve in deeply into our beloved PSU/decoupling/wiring etc topics on real grounds. For a first teaser, look here (and subsequent posts).... more to come here soon in the PSU forum, for sure.

[gootee]

Originally Posted by KSTR

Tom, I'll happily use your tools when time is due.

ATM I'm too busy with my new toy, a network analyzer, which allows to delve in deeply into our beloved PSU/decoupling/wiring etc topics on real grounds. For a first teaser, look here (and subsequent posts).... more to come here soon in the PSU forum, for sure.

Wow. Congratulations, Klaus. What are the make and model of your network analyzer?

[KSTR]

Wandel & Goltermann SNA-2, built around 1989, absolute mint condition (looks like new, really) with all documentation, only self-calibration of absolute level fails by a dB occasionally which is rather unimportant. It is said to be one of the best network/spectrum analysers of that time but having been very high $ products W&G never made it against the fierce competition from HP on the worldwide market, and sadly stopped production of their range of analysers end of the nineties....

[gootee]

Very, very nice! And I am sure that you will make the best use of it.

[gootee]

I found an easy way to add a MEASURE function to the plot! So decided I should post the new version.

Now, you can do a mouse-drag on the plot and MEASURE things, like amplitude and time interval. You can zoom-in, first, as much as you want.

A message box pops up, after you release the mouse button, and gives the ymax, ymin, Delta y, xmax, xmin, and Delta X, for the rectangle you made with the mouse, which can be anywhere in the plot area.

It seems quite useful!

I also found the real name of the author of the original plot-zoom code, Jason Vint, and included it in the header, in the code itself.

I also found his zoom-module code for Excel 2000-2003. So I will try posting a special version, for that, a little later, so that maybe the folks with Excel 2003 can have the mouse-zoom capabilities. The 2007 version (v0.992) is attached, in a zipped folder. A screen image is also attached. Notice the new MEASURE button, just above the plot.

Cheers,

Tom

[AndrewT]

You are becoming quite an expert in using/programming MS Excel.

[gootee]

Originally Posted by AndrewT

You are becoming quite an expert in using/programming MS Excel.

Thanks. But so far it's like I only know one path through a forest, and have no idea about the rest of it, nor do I know much about any of the trees or other items that I pass, on that path.

But this has been a very interesting and satisfying learning experience, for me. I have always wanted to be able to write VBA macros in Excel, and now I can, sort of.

I have found that I seem to learn best when I am well-motivated by a project goal that requires it.

The speadsheet doesn't really do much and what it does do is not extremely important in the grand scheme of things, and could be done with LT-Spice anyway. But it was a good way for me to get my feet wet and maybe as a specialized tool it will be useful to someone. Including the scalable transformer model makes it somewhat more useful.

[fas42]

Originally Posted by gootee

The speadsheet doesn't really do much and what it does do is not extremely important in the grand scheme of things, and could be done with LT-Spice anyway. But it was a good way for me to get my feet wet and maybe as a specialized tool it will be useful to someone. Including the scalable transformer model makes it somewhat more useful.

I beg to differ -- yes, I plead laziness, or more accurately, buggeredness (is that a word ... ?), I still haven't played with the thing because too many other things are swirling around, sorry!! But, such a tool can be extremely powerful if fully developed, because for a lot of people it is the ideal way to get real answers; LTspice is a step too far, having to understand all its ins and outs.

There is no reason why the spreadsheet can't be ultimately fully enhanced to make it a complete, fill in the blanks method, way of getting a power supply to be exactly the way you want it ...

Cheers,
Frank

[gootee]

Originally Posted by fas42

I beg to differ -- yes, I plead laziness, or more accurately, buggeredness (is that a word ... ?), I still haven't played with the thing because too many other things are swirling around, sorry!! But, such a tool can be extremely powerful if fully developed, because for a lot of people it is the ideal way to get real answers; LTspice is a step too far, having to understand all its ins and outs.

There is no reason why the spreadsheet can't be ultimately fully enhanced to make it a complete, fill in the blanks method, way of getting a power supply to be exactly the way you want it ...

Cheers,
Frank

Yeah. It's probably already there, unless I missed something. (Well, it is still only geared to the worst-case load. But it can probably be fooled into doing whatever you want.)

I think that you made a very good point, Frank, which is another one of the reasons I had for pursuing the development of the spreadsheet, and that is that most people just don't want to tackle LT-Spice, especially at the drop of a hat, or for just one seldom-used app (and most never will). But a fill-in-the-blanks Excel sheet is a whole different story; much easier to imagine using, for the non-Spicy people. And many people already have Excel installed.

P.S. Buggeredness? I didn't know you were into THAT. <grin> See: http://www.google.com/#sclient=psy-a...w=1262&bih=829

OK, well, at least it has other meanings, too: http://www.google.com/#hl=en&sugexp=...w=1262&bih=829