Easily Overlooked Features - Fall 2012

This section is designed to highlight one or two features per issue that may be overlooked among the many capabilities of Micro-Cap. One feature that often gets missed is the Calculator. It is invoked from the Windows menu or by clicking on its icon: When you invoke the calculator you get a display like this: What can the calculator do? It can compute the value of any expression. If you are in an analysis, expressions can include the value of any legal circuit variable. For example you can compute something like this: IC(Q12)/IB(Q12) This will calculate the effective beta of Q12. The values of IC(Q12) and IB(Q12) are the last values, those at the end of the simulation run. The calculator can also differentiate expressions. For example, enter TANH(2*(V(1))), enter V(1) for the Differentiate With Respect To variable, press the Differentiate button, and the calculator will return this display: SECH((2*V(1)))^2*2 is the derivative of TANH(2*(V(1))) with respect to V(1). The calculator can express numeric results in several formats. If you click on the drop-down arrow, you'll see and can select from a list of previously entered expressions..