At 08:59 AM 2/13/01 -0800, Ken Robertson wrote:
>I was wondering, are SMD resistors/capacitors just as good as regular
>sized ones?  I'm designing a circuit board and it's a bit tight on
>space.  I'd like to use SMD parts to save space, but not sure if the
>quality or reliability is  up to par.  I mean, they are are so damn small!
>:)  Just wanted to make sure.

Absolutely.
In fact, one of the biggest problems in assembly used to be bad solder
joints, caused by the stress of trimming the leads. In theory, a good saw
dosen't stress the joints, but in fact, what happens is that they tend to
let the saws run longer than they ought to, and end up stressing the joints
again.

SMD, no leads, no stress, no problem.

Make sure you have enough heatsinking for whatever power you might be
dissipating though, with smaller bodies, and no leads to act as free heat
sinks, some marginal designs will fail if ported directly to SMD.


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