Top Ten Things to Know About MEMS Oscillators
- MEMS components are everywhere – in your SmartPhones, Tablet PCs, Laptops, Cameras, Cars, etc. These components include microphones, gyroscopes, accelerometers and other kinds of sensing devices. MEMS Oscillators are another type of MEMS component and are rapidly being adopted in Electronics due to their inherent benefits.
- MEMS oscillators are not new – the first one was built in the 1960s. Advances in the last decade, as well as learning from volume shipments of other MEMS components has enabled MEMS oscillators to ship in high volume since 2007.
- MEMS oscillators are available in packages that are footprint compatible than quartz, and replace crystal oscillators without any design or layout changes.
- MEMS oscillators are extremely robust and reliable – after all, MEMS technology is used in life-saving applications such as stability and traction control, airbag sensors, etc. MEMS oscillators offer 10 times more robustness and reliability than quartz crystal oscillators.
- MEMS oscillators offer very high performance – stability as good as 0.5 PPM over the industrial temperature range, 500 femtoseconds of integrated RMS phase jitter, etc.
- MEMS oscillators offer many features that are just not available from quartz crystal oscillators – such as spread spectrum, very high pull range VCXOs with excellent performance and linearity, digitally programmable oscillators (DCXOs), programmable operating voltages, drive strength control for better EMI, TCXOs, low power, etc.
- The lead time and availability of a MEMS oscillator is much better than a quartz crystal oscillator because of inherent, sustainable advantages in manufacturing flow.
- MEMS oscillators are available in cost-effective plastic packages. Hence, they do not require special ceramic packages that are available only from a few vendors, nor do they require special vacuum sealing inside the ceramic package.
- MEMS oscillators are made only from silicon.
- You may already be using a device which has a MEMS oscillator – such as a laptop, digital camera, home gateway, VoIP phone, computer server, Ethernet switch, Tablet PC, E-Book reader, etc.
Processing your request, Please wait....
