Cgs synth

>I notice a strange, diagonal pattern in several areas of the Cynare PCB.
>Are these decoupling capacitors, etched into the PCB material itself?

Exactly.

>If so, is there a science to the size, shape and resultant value, or
>is this some sort of twisted experiment?

Well... it's really just a case of using up some waste space. The actual
capacitance is only in the order of a few pF (perhaps 50 for the entire PCB)
so it really only effects the sharpest transients. The theory is that it can
do so more efficiently than the 100n capacitors due to the larger "surface
area".

Cheers,

Ken
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Ken Stone sasami@...
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