Quality and reliability aspects of passive components

✍ Scribed by Patrick O'Connor

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1998
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 7 KB
• Volume: 14
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0748-8017
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1099-1638(199803/04)14:2<61::aid-qre170>3.0.co;2-u

✦ Synopsis

The literature of quality and reliability of electronics is replete with information on integrated circuits. IC failure physics is the subject of books, specialist journals and conferences. Most general references emphasise ICs. To some extent this is not surprising, since ICs have been perceived, since their invention, as the most 'exciting' aspect of modern electronics engineering. Also, for most of that time ICs made a large contribution to the unreliability of electronic systems.

Passive components (resistors, capacitors, inductors, connectors, etc.) have been considered, by contrast, to be mundane, and their quality and reliability have been taken for granted.

However, there has been steady, if less dramatic, progress in passive component technology. Also, modern ICs are now of such high quality and reliability that they very rarely fail if property applied. Since the reliability expectations of modern systems are so high, we cannot afford to ignore the contributions of the passives.

The European and US Capacitor and Resistor Technology Symposium (CARTS) addresses this aspect. We have been privileged to have arranged with the conference organisers to publish a selection of the papers presented at the 11th European symposium (CARTS Europe '96), and we plan to publish more special editions based on future conferences. CARTS USA '98 will be held on March 9-12. We hope that this converge of the passive components scene will be welcomed by our readers.