Quality of pcb of reference boards by IC Design companies

[rajat_jain_785]

Hello,

I am looking for opinion of members of this group.

I am talking about relatively small sized reference design boards containing 2-3 ICs and a few components for applications like Power Management, Audio Amplifiers, Wired and wireless Communications etc.

What is your opinion about the quality of the reference PCB design boards from IC manufacturers like Texas Instruments, Maxim, Infineon, Rohm etc.

I am asking this because I keep coming across atleast 1-2 issues in the PCB layout and schematic designs of almost every reference designs of various ICs .
I was wondering what other members of the group feel about this.

Regards
RAJAT JAIN

[robertferanec]

Until I talked to Rick Hartley, I thought reference designs suppose to be good. But, it looks like, some reference designs may not be as good as they should be - including reference designs from big chip manufacturers.

I do not remember where exactly we were talking about it, but it was probably in one of these videos:
- Ground in PCB Layout - Separate or Not Separate? (with Rick Hartley) https://youtu.be/vALt6Sd9vlY
- How to Decide on Your PCB Layer Ordering, Pouring and Stackup (with Rick Hartley) https://youtu.be/52fxuRGifLU

[qdrives]

I do not use reference designs. But that may also be that I use more simple components or that they do not exist for them. Besides, I do not trust them enough, just as I do not trust EDA libraries from manufacturers.