[time-nuts] Multiple Time Interval Counters to measure Transients?

[Magnus Danielson]

Hi Florian,

On 09/08/2012 07:34 PM, Florian Teply wrote:
> Hi fellow time nuts,
>
> quite soon I'll have to come up with a clever idea to characterize a
> few chips of a 130nm BiCMOS technology for transients. Unfortunately,
> I'll have to look at something on the order of five dozen outputs per
> chip, all at the same time.
> If money and development time was no concern, I'd probably go with
> roughly 250 Multi-GSample ADCs and sample all the outputs
> simultaneously. Unfortunately, money is an issue (who would have
> guessed? ;-P ), and I can't put several years into making this all
> work. Not to speak of handling all the data generated...
>
> The idea I have right now is employing something on the order of three
> to five comparators per output, fed with different trigger levels. That
> way I should be able to get some information on the transient shape as
> well. But then I'll have to throw a few hundred Time Interval Counters
> at the problem in order to get the information on the duration of the
> transients.  So in general, amplitude  information comes from the
> comparator trigger levels, time information from the TICs.
>
> What I expect from the DUTs is transients in the range between 1 and
> maybe 50 nanoseconds duration, but on some circuits they may be a lot
> quicker as the bipolars are wicked fast (about 3-5 ps gate delay in
> ECL inverters).
>
> What do you guys think, would a truckload of TICs do the job? Maybe not
> on the Bipolars, but at the plain CMOS this should do.
>
> Any hints?

Check out Agilents Acquiris products, in particular the U1050A-002:
http://www.home.agilent.com/agilent/product.jspx?nid=-536902438.733419.00&cc=SE&lc=eng

You may also check out what GuideTech might have to offer that fits your 
needs:
http://www.guidetech.com

There are others products, but none which to my knowledge fits your need 
of channels.

Cheers,
Magnus