Samtec helps engineers design high performance electronic systems. With the recent integration of Teraspeed® Consulting into the Samtec family, we now provide more access to our advanced systems design research, helpful videos, conference presentations, white papers, etc.
Here’s a link to two videos you should check out. Scott McMorrow, an R&D Consultant for Teraspeed® Consulting, explains how he performed extensive analyses of PCB materials for terabit backplane designs. His goal was to determine the best material to choose in order to achieve the best performance for a backplane system with a 25+ Gbps operation.
In part one of the video, Scott describes design and measurement parameters used during his test efforts. This includes taking into account various material factors such as the type of fiberglass weave, the resin system, the type of copper, and the copper treatment used by the fabricator. He also provides a thorough discussion of how to avoid modeling and simulation-induced hallucinations.
In part two, Scott focuses on how to achieve the lowest loss possible for best performance. Test elements included a standard stack-up with standard trace separation and standard dielectric thicknesses. Based on the results of these tests, Scott describes why he selected the materials he did.