Contained herein is material that is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner has no objection to the facsimile reproduction of the patent disclosure by any person as it appears in the Patent and Trademark Office patent files or records, but otherwise reserves all rights to the copyright whatsoever.
The present invention relates to printed circuit boards (PCBs); more particularly, the present invention relates to routing differential pairs on a PCB.
Recently, there has been a trend among hardware designers to implement serial interfaces between hardware components. Serial interfaces are high-speed point-to-point interfaces between box-to-box, board-to-board, or chip-to-chip interfaces. Serial interfaces reduce interconnect complexity, wires and space compared to parallel interfaces. Serial interfaces operate according to a differential mode wherein differential mode signals propagate through a pair of traces. One trace carries a conventional signal, while the other trace carries a signal that is exactly equal and opposite.
Often, the layout of the pin assignments of the interfaced components calls for the traces to be switched at the receiving component. Typically, the traces are crossed over on another layer of the printed circuit board (PCB) in order to maintain impedance matching between the traces. However, swapping the traces on different PCB layers increases the costs of manufacturing a PCB having integrated circuits and differential traces.
The present invention will be understood more fully from the detailed description given below and from the accompanying drawings of various embodiments of the invention. The drawings, however, should not be taken to limit the invention to the specific embodiments, but are for explanation and understanding only.
A method for crossing high-speed differential pairs is described. Reference in the specification to “one embodiment” or “an embodiment” means that a particular feature, structure, or characteristic described in connection with the embodiment is included in at least one embodiment of the invention. The appearances of the phrase “in one embodiment” in various places in the specification are not necessarily all referring to the same embodiment.
In the following description, numerous details are set forth. It will be apparent, however, to one skilled in the art, that the present invention may be practiced without these specific details. In other instances, well-known structures and devices are shown in block diagram form, rather than in detail, in order to avoid obscuring the present invention.
In one embodiment, FUB 110 is an integrated circuit chip that includes logic circuitry that may encompass various components (e.g., microprocessor logic, micro-controller logic, memory logic, etc.). In a further embodiment, FUB 110 transmits high-speed (e.g., microwave) serial data. FUB 110 transmits the serial data and the complement of the data to FUB 140 via differential traces 120. In one embodiment, FUB 110 serializes the data prior to transmission. However, in other embodiments, the data may be serialized prior to being received at FUB 110.
Traces 120 are coupled to FUB 110. In one embodiment, traces 120 are complementary traces that transmit differential mode signals. One trace 120 carries a typical high-speed signal, while the other trace 120 carries a signal that is exactly equal and opposite. FUB 140 is coupled to traces 120. FUB 140 is also an integrated circuit chip that includes logic circuitry that may encompass various components.
In one embodiment, FUB 140 receives high-speed serial data. FUB 140 receives the serial data and the complement of the data from FUB 110 via complementary traces 120. In a further embodiment, FUB 140 de-serializes the data after receiving the data. However, in other embodiments, the data may be de-serialized after being transmitted from FUB 140.
In some instances, the layout of the pin assignments on FUB 110 and FUB 140 may necessitate that traces 120 be switched at the FUB 140 connection. Typically, complementary traces are designed in such a way that the characteristic impedance of the traces is constant everywhere along the trace. In laying out the differential pairs, the traces should be identical. Accordingly, the traces should have identical impedance and should be of identical length.
During crossover of the traces to accommodate pin assignments, one trace is typically crossed over on another layer of the PCB in order to maintain impedance matching between the traces. After the crossover, the trace is brought back to the same level and is connected to a FUB or connector.
According to one embodiment, traces 120 are designed to crossover on the same layer of PCB 100 while maintaining a constant impedance.
According to one embodiment, the cross over section 220 of the passing trace 225 crosses the non-passing trace 227 at a right angle to component 250 in order to minimize cross talk. In addition, the narrow widths 230 of the non-passing trace 227 compensate for the higher dielectric constant provided by component 250. As a result a constant impedance is maintained as the traces 120 are crossed over.
The present invention enables the swapping of positions of the two halves of a differential pair without having to use vias to route signals to another layer of a PCB in order to maintain the proper impedance. Thus, very high frequency surface traces may be crossed without significant signal degradation.
Whereas many alterations and modifications of the present invention will no doubt become apparent to a person of ordinary skill in the art after having read the foregoing description, it is to be understood that any particular embodiment shown and described by way of illustration is in no way intended to be considered limiting. Therefore, references to details of various embodiments are not intended to limit the scope of the claims which in themselves recite only those features regarded as the invention.
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29923524 | Nov 2000 | DE |
Number | Date | Country | |
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20040084212 A1 | May 2004 | US |