Agilent Technologies has introduced what it believes to be the industry's first oscilloscope-based DDR2 compliance test application.

Agilent Technologies has introduced what it believes to be the industry's first oscilloscope-based DDR2 compliance test application, ideal for engineers working in the computer, data storage, electronic data processing and consumer electronics industries. The Agilent N5413A DDR2 test application, which runs on Infiniium 54850 and 80000 Series oscilloscopes, provides DDR2 electrical compliance measurements based on the Joint Electronic Device Engineering Council (JEDEC) JESD79-2C DDR2 SDRAM Specifications and INTEL DDR2 667/800 JEDEC Specification Addendum Rev.1.1. The N5413A also features Advanced Debug mode, which provides crucial measurements such as eye-diagrams, mask tests, ringing measurements and other tests not covered in the JEDEC specifications that help engineers discover the root causes of problems in their designs.

DDR2 memory technology is an evolutionary upgrade to its predecessor, DDR.

DDR2 devices will feature higher bandwidths and smaller chip footprints and will consume less power and generate less heat.

'Adoption of DDR2 among system OEMs and system integrators is increasing, and we expect interest to continue accelerating into 2007,' said Jay Alexander, vice president and general manager of Agilent's design validation Division.

'We are pleased to be able to offer engineers the tools they need now for testing, debugging and characterizing DDR2 designs quickly and easily'.

With the N5413A DDR2 compliance test application, engineers can use an ordinary oscilloscope to perform automated testing and margin analysis.

The application automatically configures the oscilloscope for each test and provides informative reports.

It includes margin analysis that indicates how closely the device passes or fails each test.

When engineers conduct DDR2 tests, they may encounter difficulties connecting to the target device, configuring the oscilloscope, performing the tests and analysing the measured results.

The DDR2 compliance test application guides users through these steps and does most of this work for the user.

If a designer discovers a problem, the Advanced Debug feature in the test application and debug tools in the oscilloscope are available to aid in root-cause analysis.

The Advanced Debug functionality includes a unique technique that separates read/write burst signals on the same bus, which gives engineers a powerful tool for debugging their designs.

With the increasing data rate and decreasing window validity time of DDR2 memory systems, signal integrity performance of the measurement tools becomes critical to achieving accurate and repeatable measurements.

The advantages of Agilent's Infiniium 80000 Series award-winning oscilloscopes and InfiniiMax probing include the industry's lowest noise floor, lowest jitter measurement floor, lowest trigger jitter and flattest frequency response.

Superior signal integrity in measurement tools maximises DDR2 design margins.

The JEDEC Solid State Technology Association is the semiconductor engineering standardisation body of the Electronic Industries Alliance (EIA), a trade association that represents all areas of the electronic industry.

Current Agilent N5413A DDR2 clock characterisation application owners can upgrade to the new DDR2 compliance test application at no cost.