The life of PCB

As time goes by and age goes on, people will grow old. With the progress of the times and technology, PCB will also pass through the process of nascent, developing to aging, even being eliminated due to the inability to repair.

Among various electronic products, PCB is at the core and has a legendary life. Today we will take a look at this legendary "person."

Its birth is classic. There was an engineer proposing the concept of "printed circuit board", based on his understanding and acumen of market demand. Recognized after a comprehensive review, he set out to turn this concept into reality. The process was long because it required long-term design, material selection, experiment, etc. The design is what we often say to prepare the circuit schematic. The material selection is to confirm the material, based on the product application requirements of the project. And the experiment is to verify the possibility of real production. PCB production process is quite complicated, generally need to go through: (Pre-engineering → Laminate cutting → drilling → copper plating → outer layer dry film → pattern plating → solder mask → silkscreen → surface treatment → molding → electrical testing → packaging and shipping). More detailed procedure please see the figure below.

Its growth is magical. After a series of processes, PCB finally appeared on the market, but the function was not mature. Just like a person, starting from the embryo, although he comes to the world, he is still a baby. He needs to absorb nutrients all the time and gradually grow into an individual with independent thought and behavior. The same is true for the PCB. Although the built-in driver can realize the power-on operation of some chips, there are still other chips needed to rely on the CPU to drive, and even need to slowly debug the function of sounding and data transmission. 

Its aging and elimination is helpless. The fast speed of electronic product replacement is mainly from limited life cycle, and PCB is no exception. When used by the market, it begins to play its part. However, at a certain time, It also needs to be for the life-long diagnosis of inspection, repair, replacement, and debugging. If it can't be repaired successfully or the repair cost is too high, it will be eliminated for quality and operational consideration. Then its components will be disassembled for other purposes or PCB recycled.

Like a green leaf, after withering, it will turn into fertilizer and nourish the flowers. Although the life of PCB has ended, it will also shed its brilliance in another field.