Technical Editor — EDN, 2/2/2010
Agilent Technologies has introduced a test platform that includes a digital-test console, which provides a complete integrated protocol analyzer and exerciser for one- to 16-lane implementations of the PCIe (Peripheral Component Interconnect Express) 3.0 specification, which is currently under development within the PCI-SIG (PCI Special Interest Group). The console offers the industry’s largest capture buffer and fastest download interface, with multiple nonintrusive probing options that employ new ESP (equalization-snoop-probe) technology. The company designed the console to assist with and provide accurate test results during the development of PCIe 3.0 and products that support and incorporate it. The transition to PCIe 3.0 requires test engineers and validation labs to address the new specification’s higher bus speeds and backward-compatibility requirements and to adapt to changes in the bus’s encoding scheme and several new advanced protocol features. The console addresses these enhancements by providing an ESP interface, which reliably captures data at 8 billion transfers/sec; it also incorporates an LTSSM (link-training-sequence-state-machine) exerciser for validating new encoding- and protocol-state-machine designs and a flexible GUI (graphical user interface) to aid in debugging the advanced protocol.
The test platform includes a large collection of tools for testing and validating PCIe 3.0 requirements from the electrical layer to the protocol layer. These tools include the 90000-Series Infiniium oscilloscopes, which integrate de-embedding capabilities as well as CTLE (continuous-time-linear-equalization) software that ensures the electrical compliance of future PCIe 3.0 devices; the 86100C Infiniium DCA-J (digital-communication analyzer/jitter), which provides one-button ease of use and performs precision waveform analysis as well as jitter, TDR (time-domain-reflectometer), and S (scattering)-parameter measurements; and the N4903B J-BERT (jitter/bit-error-ratio tester), a high-performance serial BERT that performs complete jitter-tolerance testing for accurate receiver characterization and compliance testing. The platform also includes the N5990A test-automation software for complete automation of PCIe-compliance testing using the J-BERT, ParBERT (parallel BERT), and other Agilent instruments; and the ADS (Advanced Design System), a software suite that includes a complete set of simulation tools ranging from frequency-, time-, numeric-, and physical-domain simulation to electromagnetic-field simulation for design characterization and optimization. The average system price is $100,000