{"id":9204,"date":"2014-01-13T13:19:58","date_gmt":"2014-01-13T20:19:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.mentor.com\/hyperblog\/?p=1467"},"modified":"2026-03-27T09:20:50","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T13:20:50","slug":"how-to-connect-a-capacitor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/2014\/01\/13\/how-to-connect-a-capacitor\/","title":{"rendered":"How to connect a capacitor?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Capacitors are the backbone of a board power distribution network, or PDN.\u00a0 However, just as important as having the capacitors connected to the PDN is how they are connected.\u00a0 If you think that connecting them with inch-long 5-mil traces is a good idea, you might want to reconsider (or maybe you are still living in the &#8217;70s?).\u00a0 Obviously that is an extreme example, but there are a number of nuances to connecting capacitors to the board to maximize their effectiveness as part of the PDN.\u00a0 I actually analyzed and quantified some common capacitor mounting methods in the following article: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pcdandf.com\/pcdesign\/index.php\/current-issue\/241-designer-s-notebook\/9233-designers-notebook-1401\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">http:\/\/www.pcdandf.com\/pcdesign\/index.php\/current-issue\/241-designer-s-notebook\/9233-designers-notebook-1401<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Among the variables explored are the connections to the planes, and that doesn&#8217;t just mean the connections themselves, but the plane configuration.\u00a0 This can have a huge effect on the mounted inductance of the capacitor.\u00a0 The separation between the power and ground planes is probably the most important.\u00a0 Planes which are very close together are actually much more effective in minimizing the mounted inductance of the capacitor than planes which are further apart but closer to the capacitor (like in layers closer to the top).\u00a0 In fact, that is one of the many tradeoffs you can analyze in the PDN editor in HyperLynx LineSim when trying to plan your PDN design.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Capacitors are the backbone of a board power distribution network, or PDN.\u00a0 However, just as important as having the capacitors&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":71672,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spanish_translation":"","french_translation":"","german_translation":"","italian_translation":"","polish_translation":"","japanese_translation":"","chinese_translation":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"industry":[],"product":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-9204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/71672"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9204"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9204\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10385,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9204\/revisions\/10385"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9204"},{"taxonomy":"industry","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/industry?post=9204"},{"taxonomy":"product","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product?post=9204"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/electronic-systems-design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=9204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}