At a recent talk I gave in the Detroit region, I had the pleasure of meeting Joanna McLellan, an EMC consultant. I noticed on the back of her business card a list of her 10 Golden Rules of EMC. These are all simple, concise principles everyone should know. I thought having them all in one place, sort of as a cheat sheet, is such a great idea. She’s given me permission to reprint them here:

1. Think wavelength, not frequency
2. The longer you wait, the more you pay
3. There is no such thing as ground above 100 kHz
4. Conductors have length, phase change and inductance
5. Two conductors separated by a dielectric is a capacitor
6. Never use any more bandwidth than you need
7. Add resistors rather than capacitors
8. Keep node impedance below 10k Ohms
9. Fractional wavelength is one thing, dimensions near or above a wavelength is another
10. Welcome to the brave new world above 100 kHz  

If you would like a copy of her business card with these rules printed on the back, so you can keep them in your pocket as a handy reference, drop her a note. You can learn more about her here.