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New ASSET ScanWorks toolkit to validate DDR3 memory for Intel platforms

29 September 2010 - A new toolkit for ASSET's ScanWorks platform for embedded instruments will allow memory suppliers to thoroughly validate the connectivity of their DDR3 memory chips with certain advanced Intel processors. ASSET InterTech is the leading supplier of open tools for embedded instrumentation.

The ScanWorks DDR3 memory toolkit will verify the performance of the bus that connects DDR3 memory devices to Intel's processors based on the next-generation micro-architecture codenamed Sandy Bridge. ASSET and Intel have been collaborating on validation and test tools that take advantage of Intel's embedded instrumentation technology, the Intel® Interconnect Built-In Self Test (Intel® IBIST). Intel has been placing Intel IBIST into its advanced processors and chipsets to facilitate validation, test and debug applications. ASSET's ScanWorks platform has tools for utilizing Intel IBIST.

"As the speeds of the buses connecting these devices on a circuit board accelerate dramatically, finding new ways to ensure the quality of these links and the interoperability of the chips is important to Intel," said Geof Findley, of Intel's Platform Memory Operations (PMO) Ecosystem Management. "Thus, Intel and ASSET have collaborated to expand the deployment of Intel IBIST in validation use at memory suppliers. In this way, memory suppliers will be able to offer additional value to our mutual customers."

The ScanWorks DDR3 toolkit employs the Intel IBIST embedded instrumentation in an Intel processor to drive data patterns onto the bus that connects the processor to DDR3 memory devices. These patterns form the basis for tests that verify the read/write capabilities of the memory bus. In addition, certain operational parameters on the bus, such as its voltage and signal timing, can be modulated.

"We are very pleased to work with Intel to enable the memory supplier community with these DDR3 tools," said Tim Caffee, ASSET's vice president of design validation. "In addition to the value this ScanWorks toolkit has for memory suppliers themselves, it also will improve the productivity of equipment manufacturers since they will be receiving memory devices that have been validated with the same toolkit they are using to validate circuit board designs."

ScanWorks® - Platform for Embedded Instruments

ASSET, through its ScanWorks platform, is applying the experience it has gained from two decades as a leading supplier of IEEE 1149.1 boundary-scan (JTAG) test tools to the development of open embedded instrumentation tools. The boundary-scan infrastructure that is embedded into chips and circuit boards is one of several technologies which can form the basis for an embedded instrumentation toolset. In recent years, ASSET has significantly enhanced ScanWorks beyond boundary-scan test with the addition of other embedded instrumentation technologies, including processor-controlled test (PCT) and tools for Intel® IBIST (Interconnect Built-In Self Test), an embedded instrumentation technology that Intel® and other companies are embedding into next-generation chips and chipsets.