Suntan Comparison of Ceramics Capacitor and Tantalum Capacitor
Although the construction techniques and materials used to manufacture multilayer ceramic and tantalum capacitors are completely different, the basic applications still remain the same. Capacitors in the 0.1 - 22µF range are used mainly for digital circuit decoupling and filtering. Acting as local supplies of charge, capacitors assist power supplies in remaining at a constant DC voltage despite the continuous switching of digital signal circuitry. Capacitors also function as simple, single pole filters and can be used in conjunction with other devices (resistors and inductors) to create higher order filter circuits.
As much as tantalums and ceramics are both capacitors, they do have many different properties. The case sizes and capacitance values available will first be studied. The impedance curves, the parasitic inductance (ESL) and equivalent series resistance (ESR) for each of the technologies will also be outlined. Then the electrical performance under a variety of conditions, such as temperature and DC bias, will be examined.
