FPGA Based Self-test Systems

With I/O speeds increasing rapidly, there is a need to find efficient ways of designing hardware circuits to characterize and test these high speed interfaces. Traditionally, Bit Error Rate (BER) is evaluated using software simulations and stand-alone BER test products, which are either time-consuming or expensive. In this book, I demonstrate the design and implementation of a self-contained FPGA-based systems that can be used to test these interconnects. We present a user-configurable system that is capable of generating and evaluating the ITU-T recommended test patterns simultaneously over three channels with data rates of up to 3 Gb/s per channel. This includes the design of high-speed random pattern generator designs in Verilog and C-code for the integrated Power-PC processor to handle control of the user interface. The book also includes schematics of the current system and board design ideas for the readers to design their own systems.