Software Performs Serial Data Link Analysis
Portable Design News, Monday October 08, 2007
Tektronix, Inc. has announced a new end-to-end high speed serial data analysis (SDLA) software package with test capabilities extending from a transmitter to a receiver and including the connecting channel. The new 80SJNB Advanced software runs on the Tektronix DSA8200 Digital Serial Analyzer. 80SJNB Advanced combined with the DSA8200 platform’s TDR/TDT and S-Parameter support through iConnect software provides engineers with the first complete Serial Data Link Analysis (SDLA) package to ensure a readable signal reaches the receiver.
The latest high-speed serial technologies are at the core of the computer, consumer electronics, and communications industry designs and require test equipment capable of higher performance and more extensive analysis. The new 80SJNB Advanced software includes feed-forward and decision feedback equalization (FFE and DFE) for a virtual view of the signal as it appears at the comparator inside the receiver. Emulation of the interconnect channel enables testing the transmitter performance against multiple interconnects. Support for fixture de-embedding facilitates virtual probing at inaccessible points. The complete SDLA offering provides the fundamental measurements needed to validate compliance of high-speed serial standards such as 10 GbE Ethernet, PCI-Express and SATA, enabling the development of higher performance products for the new digital world.
Complete Link Impairment Compensation
Equalization is a broad term for several techniques of manipulating the signal shape in order to overcome frequency dependent loss of the channel. This loss changes the shape of the NRZ data signal at the receiver from the desired square-wave to severely distorted, closed eye waveform. 80SJNB Advanced provides the important equalization methods of FFE and DFE on the receiver side, and supports generation and measurement of pre-emphasis and de-emphasis on the transmitter side.
Another capability of the software is channel emulation, providing customers a push-button way to see the waveform impairments due to channel (interconnect) transmission loss. Through channel emulation engineers are able to acquire the signal at the transmitter output, and distort it by an (emulated) channel – be it a backplane, connector, anything that can be described with TDR/TDT or with S-Parameters – and verify the performance at the channel end, without waiting for the physical hardware’s availability. Final analysis is performed using 80SJNB Advanced jitter and noise decomposition and BER eye diagrams.
With 80SJNB Advanced, design engineers gain the ability to compare different transmitter-to-channel-to-equalizer combinations, resulting in improved design and verification. The waveform and the eye diagram at any point are not only viewable, but also available for a complete Jitter, Noise and BER analysis.
Package Also Provides SSC Support for Advanced Transmitter Characterization
Acquisition and advanced analysis of complex signals is increasingly needed on transmitters with spread spectrum clocks (SSC). 80SJNB software and the DSA8200 now provide engineers a sampling oscilloscope with an unmatched ability to perform SSC acquisitions and SSC jitter analysis. SSC is widely used in desktop and laptop PCs and is incorporated into standards including SATA and PCI-Express.
Pricing and Availability
80SJNB Advanced software is available with a new DSA8200 or as an upgrade if a customer has already purchased 80SJNB or 80SJNB Essentials. The U.S. MSRP for 80SJNB is $15,800 when ordered with a DSA8200. Existing customers of 80SJNB software can download 80SJNB Essentials from tek.com free of charge, or can upgrade to 80SJNB Advanced for $4,900, U.S. MSRP. Older Tektronix sampling mainframes are supported as well; however, an upgrade to the computing platform is required in some cases.
Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton, OR (503) 627-4027 [www.tektronix.com]
