IEEE 1149.6 - a practical perspective

The IEEE 1149.6 standard was approved in March of 2003. The standard extends the capability of the IEEE 1149.1 standard to include AC-coupled and/or differential nets. These nets are predominant in multi-gigabit serial technology. This paper presents a short overview of the 1149.6 standard and the issues that it addresses. The paper discusses design, verification and test considerations that must be dealt with when implementing 1149.6 logic on a component or a board. Since 1149.6 addresses a problem that is in part analog in nature, there are several new issues that must be dealt with which are not covered in previous 1149 based standards. The paper discusses the nature of these issues and their impact on design, verification and test. The paper is intended to be tutorial, providing tips and techniques to allow the user to quickly understand and implement an 1149.6 based design.