- Sun Sep 22, 2013 12:34 pm
#163766
I'm in the process of re-organizing my growing collection of components, which has turned out to be difficult in several regards. First of all, finding proper containers for the various types of parts is proving frustrating, since each part type requires a completely different type of container (Aide-Tex Box-All cases are great for chip resistors/caps/inductors/etc. but I still haven't found a good solution for SMD IC's other than the baseball-card-page type organizers like SF sells...). But now, I'm finding an even more frustrating challenge ahead of me. In the past, my organization has been sorely lacking or completely nonexistant in some cases, and now I have a lot of small SMD components whose marking codes don't actually include part numbers. Most of the larger SOIC's and QFP's include a complete part number on the package marking, but the smaller SOT-23's, for example, typically DON'T have the part number, or even a manufacturer logo, and instead contain some cryptic 3 or 4 letter code that doesn't really help in identifying the part via Google. Does anybody have any experience with identifying parts by these codes? Right now, the best I've been able to do is pull up my Digi-Key order history along with my sample part orders from all of the various companies that I've ordered samples from and pulling up the datasheets one by one and hoping that they include package marking information in the datasheet, which is less than fun. At the very least, I do know that these are all commercially-produced chips, not some obscure, obsolete part. Any ideas? I have a pretty decent pile to sort through, so any help that anyone can provide would be greatly appreciated. Considering the amount of work I have ahead of me, I figured it was worth it to at least ask.
Kids, label and organize your chips as soon as you receive them, or 6 months down the road, you'll really wish you had. Some parts don't even have any markings at all! Let's just say I'm REALLY glad I kept my 0805 capacitors organized
Kids, label and organize your chips as soon as you receive them, or 6 months down the road, you'll really wish you had. Some parts don't even have any markings at all! Let's just say I'm REALLY glad I kept my 0805 capacitors organized