Dumb question. I brought the smoke out if my new HP8903a with the processor upgrade. I was probing, found the blown output fuses, replaced them, pulling the leads off, my Parkinsons tremor caused an issue on the output attenuator board. Smoke, etc. I guess the ground lead touched a metal transistor can or something and that was all she wrote. One transistor had a CE short and two 16.2ohm resistors went up in smoke. No other damage from what I can tell. The circuit is signal-carrying. If anyone is interested and has the schematic, they were A6q6,a6q8 and the two, 16.2ohm, current limiting resistors.
So here`s the question, should I use a CAN-3 package for both transistors, as they were, or is it safe to switch to plastic? I'm concerned about noise. I have many (read that as 1000s) of the plastic. The cases weren`t grounded, no heat sinks or heat spreaders, etc. This isn`t rf, just the last stage of a high quality, or higher quality, audio oscillator.
Thanks,
Jerry.T.Hancock