An Enhanced Statistical Analysis Method for I/O Links Considering Supply Voltage Fluctuations and Intersymbol Interference

Statistical link analysis methods were previously developed for effective computation of bit error rate due to intersymbol interference (ISI). In addition to ISI, supply voltage fluctuations at output drivers can cause jitter and amplitude uncertainty in I/O links. In this paper, the enhanced statistical link analysis method considering both ISI and supply voltage fluctuations is clearly reformulated and experimentally validated step by step by various measurements. A silicon integrated circuit (IC) is designed, fabricated, and assembled on a manufactured printed circuit board (PCB). The supply voltage fluctuations on the IC with regard to the receiver reference voltage are extracted from measurements at the IC and PCB. Also, the impulse response of the total output channel is extracted from the measurements of the driver and channel characteristics. The statistical eye diagrams of the channel output including both ISI effects and the supply voltage fluctuations are then calculated and validated by comparison with the direct eye measurements.