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Off-Chip Skew Measurement and Compensation Module (SMCM) Design for Built-Off Test Chip

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Abstract

Skew calibration and compensation are critical ATE features for reliable functional test, particularly for applications such as memory chips since most mainstream memories use a source-synchronous interface. This paper presents a new Skew Measurement and Compensation Module (SMCM) design for off-chip skew calibration from Time Domain Reflectometry (TDR) measurements. It consists of coarse and fine parts which enable the circuit to detect a large skew range with high resolution. Circuit complexity is reduced through use of the proposed automatic edge detection method which controls coarse/fine operations. We also present skew compensation circuits which can de-skew off-chip signals based on the skew calibration. The SMCM occupies a small area, making it suitable for implementation in a Built-Off Test (BOT) chip. The circuits were implemented using a 130 nm technology in a Built-Off Test Interface (BOTI) developed for 800 Mbps DDR2 memory functional test.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Computer Engineering Research Center, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, 78712, USA

    Kihyuk Han, Joonsung Park, Jae Wook Lee, Jaeyong Chung & Jacob A. Abraham

  2. Samsung Electronics, San-16 Banwol-dong, Hwaseong-si, Gyeonggi-do, South Korea

    Eonjo Byun, Cheol-Jong Woo & Sejang Oh

Authors
  1. Kihyuk Han
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  2. Joonsung Park
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  3. Jae Wook Lee
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  4. Jaeyong Chung
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  5. Eonjo Byun
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  6. Cheol-Jong Woo
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  7. Sejang Oh
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  8. Jacob A. Abraham
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Correspondence to Kihyuk Han.

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Responsible Editor: C. Metra

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Han, K., Park, J., Lee, J.W. et al. Off-Chip Skew Measurement and Compensation Module (SMCM) Design for Built-Off Test Chip. J Electron Test 27, 429–439 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10836-011-5213-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10836-011-5213-z

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