5.9 Sand to Circuit (Video)

One of the obvious "points" of the video is the real and aparent complexity of making ICs. Several other aspects of the electronics industry are less obvious.

First, manufacturing of most electronics today is a photographic process. The had assembly that was required for vaccume tubes and there associated connections is all but gone. Today the individual devices are "fabracated" on the IC by a many step process, but for the most part, hundreds or thousands at a time. Some steps of the fabrication will batch process hundreds of wafers at a time. A single 8 inch wafers will have between hundreds and thousands of inddividual dies. The manufacturing of Printed Circuit boards is also photograpic. So, for the most part, the interconnection of individual integrated ICs in a final product is also photograpic, NOT hand assembly. This helps keeps the costs down.

Second, there are limits to integrated circuits.

• Power limits. If the device gets too hot it burns up. One of the major limits in IC manufacturing has been caused by the power used by individual parts of the circuit. To go faster, it usually has taken more power.
• Circuit Density. Imaging and positioning technology both limit how small individual features can be on an integrated circuit. Currently just the lenses can cost over $1,000,000. As the wafer goes through the process of being made into integrated circuits it must be positioned over and over again to be exposed to the new image layer. If it is "off" the device will not work.
• Wrong kind of parts. Some devices do not integrate well. Inductors, large capacitors, and crystals are all examples. Different kinds of circuits have been devised to limit the need for this kind of circuit. But some are still required.

One of the other assemblies included surface mount assembly. This is where the part is held to the board by the soldier. Not by its physical placement through holes in the board, then being soldered to the PC board.