Signal Integrity: Interface test
Signal Integrity is essential for the correct functioning of all interfaces in your digital design. It is highly influenced by the transmitter and receiver implementation in the chip, as well as the design of the transmission channel, including PCB traces, vias, connectors and cables. Eye diagrams provide an immediate insight to judge the quality of the signal. As Signal Integrity impairments are often pattern-dependent, a high acquisition rate is helpful to catch many acquisitions in a reasonable time and catch worst case scenarios in the eye diagram. For further analysis and debug, these tests are typically flanked by an accurate measurement and decomposition of jitter and noise as well as TDR/TDT measurements on critical signal traces. Probing is key to get good measurement results and deembedding is used to remove the effects of the signal path between probe point and test point and to get accurate results at the desired measurement plane. With real-time deembedding, even triggering on the corrected waveform is possible.
With expertise in both the time and frequency domain and by working closely with the corresponding standardization bodies, Rohde & Schwarz provides a wide range of Signal Integrity solutions for interface test, on system- as well as on chip-level.
