Keysight Reveals DDR5 Testing & Validation System
by Anton Shilov on February 6, 2019 8:30 AM EST
Keysight, an electronic measurement company, has introduced the industry’s first off-the-shelf testing and validation system for DDR5 DRAM. The N6475A DDR5 Tx compliance test software is aimed at developers of various products that will use the next-generation memory.
Keysight’s DDR5 testing and validation system includes the company’s N6475A DDR5 Tx compliance test software as well as its own M8040A 64 Gbaud High-performance bit error rate tester (BERT) and Infiniium UXR-Series Real-Time Oscilloscope hardware (though it can work with other hardware too). The application performs jitter, electrical, timing, as well as eye measurements, and is designed to test the transmitter PHY of DDR5 SDRAM, data buffer, and register chips. The program automatically compares the results with the DDR5 spec test limits and shows how closely the device passes or fails each test.
Previously developers of various DDR5 products had to design their own testing software or perform all the measurements and analysis manually, which greatly lengthens development time. Now that Keysight’s DDR5 Tx compliance test software and hardware is available, it will be far easier for engineers to optimize transmitter, receiver, and channel designs. So this should speed up how quickly hardware vendors are able to bring DDR5-based devices to the market..
Keysight’s N6475A DDR5 Tx compliance test software and appropriate hardware is now available. Pricing is available upon request.
Related Reading:
- SK Hynix Develops First 16 Gb DDR5-5200 Memory Chip, Demos DDR5 RDIMM
- Cadence & Micron DDR5 Update: 16 Gb Chips on Track for 2019
- Cadence and Micron Demo DDR5-4400 IMC and Memory, Due in 2019
- JEDEC: DDR5 to Double Bandwidth Over DDR4, NVDIMM-P Specification Due Next Year
Source: Keysight
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DanNeely - Wednesday, February 6, 2019 - link
I've seen the graphic shown on the bottom half of that display a number of times when talking about signalling quality for new memory busses. I've never seen a good explanation of what it's supposed to be showing other than at a very high level that sharp skinny lines are good and fat smeary ones are bad.brakdoo - Wednesday, February 6, 2019 - link
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_patternZizy - Wednesday, February 6, 2019 - link
The simplest explanation: What you essentially want from this diagram is figure out if you have reliable bit value of 1 or 0. So, you keep switching between the two and measuring voltage to see if you can distinguish the two. If your eye is wide open, you have a reasonably large window (both time and voltage) in which you can measure to know if you have a 0 or 1. If you have smeary mess of an eye that is barely open, your time window and voltage window is smaller. It will still work in a lab, but fail once you throw in real-world mess of temperature, component degradation, supply voltage/ripple or whatever else might influence the device.Now, the eye diagram also tells where you screwed up and other reliability considerations, eg eye might be smeary because your rise from 0 to 1 isn't always as fast; or it might be smeary because rise doesn't always start at the same instant; or it might be nicely open but show sizeable voltage overshoots which might damage other components over time. From these features, you can figure out what you need to improve.
edzieba - Wednesday, February 6, 2019 - link
"M8040A 64 Gbaud High-performance bit error rate tester (BERT)"Somewhere in the bowels of Keysight is an engineer furiously trying to backronym ERNIE to a piece of production test equipment.
close - Wednesday, February 6, 2019 - link
Waiting for the inevitable "no USB C or 10Gb Eth, no buy".brakdoo - Wednesday, February 6, 2019 - link
Don't forget the headphone connector or missing certification for waterproofing.close - Wednesday, February 6, 2019 - link
Damn it! I knew there was something else I cannot live without. Also microSD. And 4K 144Hz. And RGB LEDs all around.willis936 - Wednesday, February 6, 2019 - link
I’ve played with the M8020 at the lab I work at. It has an ATX power connector, mini USB port, an ethernet port, and a few dozen SMA connectors. That’s it. The only way to control it is through the mini USB. You can’t run the remote control software over ethernet. If one crappy port breaks you have a mllion dollar brick.DanNeely - Wednesday, February 6, 2019 - link
How else are they supposed to sell the $100k/year service contract.PeachNCream - Wednesday, February 6, 2019 - link
That test rig needs a lot more RGB if Keysight intends to earn any street cred. Maybe a set of alloy rims too...Oh, can it run Crysis?