This list of Smith Chart software is a mixture of professional packages for purchase, shareware, and freeware,
plus links to websites featuring Smith Chart topics.
Smith Chart Flash Presentation - by Brent Locher. An interactive Smith Chart tutorial with 5 different flash
programs that contain a lot of embedded audio.
Smith Chart - Animated
tutorial by Keith Schaub of Savvy Paper
Smith
Chart for Excel by RF Cafe - two unique spreadsheets that allow entering either
S-parameters or complex numbers - FREE
Smith Chart
for Visio by RF Cafe - built on the MS Visio grid in vector format so that resizing
retains all the detail. Use it for reports and presentations.
Because of the way in which the addition of series and parallel capacitances and inductances move along
lines of admittance and reactance, there are certain areas on the Smith Chart, known as forbidden regions,
within which the combinations of inductance and capacitance cannot be used to translate the impedance to the
center of the chart (perform an impedance match). The reason can be made clear by an example.
Series-added reactive components (inductors and capacitors) move the impedance point along constant
resistance lines as shown in red and purple to the right. Shunt-added reactive components move the impedance
point along the constant conductance lines as shown in blue and green to the right. Recall that adding
a shunt capacitor increases overall capacitance, and adding a series capacitor decreases the overall capacitance.
The opposite is true for inductance.
Suppose the impedance of a source lies in the Forbidden Region in the Smith Chart in the upper right
(above). Adding series inductor increases the overall inductance and therefore moves the point along the
red line (constant resistance), which keeps the impedance within the Forbidden Region. The addition of
a shunt capacitor increases the overall capacitance and moves the point along the green line (constant
conductance), but can never move the point to the center where 50 Ω lies.
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