Agilent Technologies Introduces Industry's Most Complete SAS-3 Compliance Test Software for Automated 12-Gbps Transmitter Measurements

SAS-3 is a third-generation high-speed serial bus used primarily for high-performance enterprise storage applications. It operates at data rates of up to 12-Gbps. For storage devices, chipsets and expanders to operate at 12-Gbps, the transmitter has to dynamically adapt its three-tap equalizer settings so the signal can be optimized for a specific link. Testing this new capability requires the SAS3_EYEOPENING script for proper validation and margin analysis. It enables engineers to address potential design issues early in the design cycle and get their products to market faster.

Agilent N5412C SAS-3 compliance test software for Infiniium oscilloscopes provides design and validation engineers with a fast and easy way to verify physical-layer transmitter compliance for SAS 1.5-Gbps, 3-Gbps, 6-Gbps and 12-Gbps silicon, expanders, port multipliers, and high-density and solid-state disk drives. The test methods are based on the T10 SAS-3 specification and University of New Hampshire InterOperability Lab Consortium's SAS-3 physical-layer test suite.

Agilent's engagement with the SAS-3 standard and involvement in plugfests means we are in a unique position to develop full-coverage test solutions that evolve with the standards, giving engineers the ability to design their products with the highest confidence, said Jay Alexander, vice president and general manager of Agilent's Oscilloscope Products Division.

N5412C SAS-3 software performs a wide range of tests for spread-spectrum clocking, transmitted signal quality and out-of-band specifications, as well as transmitter equalizers and end-to-end simulations. The software also supports automated compliance testing for intra-enclosure and internal-enclosure interface points. It displays the results in a flexible report format and provides a margin analysis that shows how closely a device passes or fails each test.

Agilent's Infiniium 90000 X- and Q-Series oscilloscopes are ideal for SAS-3 measurements because they offer analog bandwidths of up to 63 GHz, with the lowest noise floor, deepest memory and flattest response. Engineers using Infiniium 90000 X- and Q-Series oscilloscopes with Agilent's automated N5412C SAS-3 compliance test software can maximize their design margins and gain greater insight into their system performance. In addition, engineers can recover margins by correcting the cable and probe losses using Agilent's unique N2809A PrecisionProbe correction software, available only with Infiniium Series oscilloscopes.

Engineers designing and developing SAS interfaces can also use the Agilent J-BERT N4903B high-performance serial BERT for physical-layer receiver compliance testing and characterization, as well as the Agilent DCA-X 86100D TDR and E5071C ENA network analyzer with Option TDR for characterizing transmit and receive termination impedances and return loss, per the requirements of the SAS-3 specification.