Virtual Reality Will Change Circuit Board Design (For The Better)

It sometimes seems as if people don’t yet grasp the extent to which virtual reality is becoming both an entertaining and a useful technology. On the entertainment front, we tend to limit conversations to gaming. But really there are a lot of other fun things to talk about! Road To VR did a piece specifically on this topic and listed, for example, playing music, attending musical events, watching films with friends, and working out — all in VR.

It’s on the utility front though that VR tends to be particularly overlooked. But the truth of the matter is that the technology has become useful in a number of different work environments, and with regard to all kinds of important products. And in this category, the design and production of printed circuit boards may prove to be the ultimate hidden perk of VR tech.

Printed circuit boards, or PCBs, for those who don’t know, are some of those little pieces of technology you never think about, but which make more or less everything about modern life possible. They’re the tiny green chips upon which electrical components and connectors are placed, and they’re built into our electronics to, well… make them work properly. Simple and small as they may be, PCBs are enormously complex though, which of course means that they’re the result of fairly intricate design processes. And virtual reality holds clear potential to improve those processes and change PCB design for the better.

How?

Improving Existing Methods

Right now, PCB design is basically done via a combination of software modelling and something vaguely similar to code. Already however, this results in a sort of virtual schematic of a PCB that can be manipulated and worked on by all parties involved. In a write-up on navigating the perils of PCB design, Altium explains that this “single unified model” has already improved the process. It provides rapid and accurate synchronization in terms of the parts of the design, and makes for a reliable final result to be sent off for production.

But it is also clear, when we think about VR, that the modelling aspect of PCB design can be made more efficient and intuitive. Manipulating a virtual PCB in 3D space, rather than on computer and tablet screens, will simply make for a more exact process, and is likely an inevitable advancement in time.

Making Testing More Intuitive

In addition to making initial design more efficient and intuitive, VR could (and undoubtedly will) provide for more effective testing processes as well. As of now, PCB design software includes mechanisms and commands for testing, such that a model can effectively be “run” to see if electrical signals transmit as expected. This turns up any existing issues, which can in turn be dealt with. In VR though, one can envision this whole process being both quicker and more visual, perhaps allowing for more intuitive trial-and-error processes.

Our look at ‘Time Control In Virtual Reality’ even comes to mind as a possible way in which this could work — with signals being “rewound” and “fast-forwarded” so that problems could be identified visually in 3D space.

Generating More Interest

There is also the simple possibility that turning the current method of software-based PCB design into more of a 3D, VR-based electrical architecture of sorts could generate more interest in the field.

Just last year, CNBC reported on some massive projections for VR in places of business — to the tune of a possible $4.26 billion (a little over £3 billion) industry by 2024. There are various reasons for this expected growth, but among them are that workers are adapting readily to VR. It’s perceived as a technology that makes things easier, more flexible, and more enjoyable, and this would likely be the case in PCB design as well.

Altogether these are simple but significant possibilities that stand to transform PCB design for the better. In a few years’ time we could see exciting new design and testing methods, and more interest in the field as a result. This in turn will give us even more capable PCBs, and by extension the ongoing improvement of electronic devices.

[This is a contributed post]