Schematic Review

What a review actually is

We read a design that already exists and hand back a written, ranked list of what will fail at the fab house or on the bench. Not a folder of screenshots, not a verbal walk-through on a call — a document you can action item by item, against your own revision of the board.

The review covers your schematic and the layout together. A board can be electrically correct on paper and still fail because the return path breaks under a fast edge, because a decoupling capacitor sits on the wrong side of a via, or because the mechanical envelope does not fit the parts you have chosen. We look for those.

What we check

• Stack-up and impedance intent — whether the layer order, copper weights and dielectric assumptions match the impedances the nets actually need.
• Return-path continuity — planes under fast edges, splits, stitching vias, and where a signal is allowed to cross a gap at all.
• Decoupling and grounding — placement relative to the pin, loop area, and whether the ground scheme is consistent across the board.
• Thermal paths — where heat goes, whether copper and vias actually carry it, and whether a part is being asked to dissipate more than its package allows.
• Mechanical fit — keep-outs, mounting holes, connector access, and whether the board fits the enclosure it has to live in.
• Documentation — whether the fabrication notes describe the board well enough for a house that has never seen the project.

What you get back

A document, ordered by severity, with a finding, the reason it matters, and a suggested fix for each item. Items are written so you can hand them to a junior designer and have them actioned without a second call. We do not rewrite your board — we tell you what to change and why.

How it runs

Send the schematic, the layout files, the stack-up you have quoted, and the mechanical constraints. We come back with questions within a day, and the review itself lands in a few working days depending on board size. Yours or your vendor’s design, reviewed the same way.

Trace widths, clearances and impedance values quoted anywhere on this page are industry references rather than guarantees of output — confirm the final numbers against your fabricator’s current capability data.