Miscellaneous active electrical nonlinear devices – circuits – and – Signal converting – shaping – or generating – Current driver
Reexamination Certificate
2001-07-06
2002-07-02
Lam, Tuan T. (Department: 2816)
Miscellaneous active electrical nonlinear devices, circuits, and
Signal converting, shaping, or generating
Current driver
C326S030000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06414525
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an I/O interface circuit capable of carrying out rapid data transmission, a semiconductor chip having this I/O interface circuit and a semiconductor system provided with a plurality of the semiconductor chips.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In recent years, the performance of high-performance LSI such as a micro processor has been rising rapidly. This rise of the performance is supported by application of high frequency internal clock by process scaling or introduction of pipeline method.
On the other hand, currently, signal transmission between semiconductor chips cannot meet this application of high frequency internal clock inside the semiconductor chip sufficiently. In a conventional TTL/LV-TTL I/O interface, signal transmission with high frequency wave of more than 100 MHz is difficult to realize due to crosstalk, simultaneous signal switching noise (SSN), reflection of signal in transmission path and the like. Therefore, the TTL/LV-TTL interface and the like is a bottleneck of the performance of a high performance LSI.
If the signal transmission speed between the semiconductor chips is not increased, a trend of multiple pins is indispensable for securing a band width, so that this largely influence production, mounting work, and board cost. Therefore, in the high-performance LSI field, an I/O interface capable of high speed signal transmission has been introduced gradually.
FIGS. 1A-1C
show a TTL/LV-TTL I/O interface which has been generally used in a conventional art.
FIG. 1A
is a structure diagram thereof,
FIG. 1B
is a potential waveform diagram upon “H” level transmission, and
FIG. 1C
is a current waveform diagram upon “H” level transmission.
When for example, “H” level is transmitted from a semiconductor chip
110
of TTL to a semiconductor chip
120
of LV-TTL through a transmission path
101
, P channel MOSFET
112
and N channel MOSFET
113
constituting an I/O buffer
111
of the semiconductor chip
110
are both turned on. As a result, current flowing through the transmission path
101
changes as shown in FIG.
1
C and with an convergence of current amount, the potential is stabilized on VDDQ level as shown in FIG.
1
B. Then, on the side of the semiconductor chip
120
, the “H” level signal of the transmission path
101
is received by a differential amplifier
121
.
Because the side of the semiconductor chip
120
in input mode becomes an open end in this I/O interface, signal reflection occurs in the transmission path
101
so that transmission waveform is distorted. Further, because the logical amplitude is large, noise due to dI/dt occurs in high speed operation. Thus, in the high speed I/O interface, generally, the transmission path is terminated.
FIGS. 2A-2E
show high speed interface circuits of conventional various terminating types.
FIG. 2A
shows a GTL/RSL interface,
FIG. 2B
shows a push-pull type HSTL interface,
FIG. 2C
shows a SSTL interface,
FIG. 2D
shows a CTT interface and
FIG. 2E
shows a LVDS interface.
Because terminating resistors
201
,
301
,
401
,
501
,
601
are mounted on a board in the vicinity of the second semiconductor chip
2
, if signal is transmitted from the first semiconductor chip
1
to the second semiconductor chip
2
, signal reflection at a buffer portion of the second semiconductor chip
2
in input mode is suppressed. Further, because dI/dt can be set small as well as the logical amplitude is small, there does not occur much noise.
FIG. 3
is a structure diagram showing a conventional high-speed interface circuit disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No.8-204539.
In the same Figure, reference numeral
710
denotes a transmission path, numerals
711
-
714
denote a terminating resistor, numerals
720
,
730
,
740
,
750
denote a semiconductor chip, numeral
731
denotes a resisting element control means, and numerals
732
,
733
denote an on chip terminating means comprising N-MOSFET.
Because in an open drain I/O interface circuit, a large reflection occurs in the transmission path when that circuit is driven from “L” level to “H” level, in this example, the signal sending side is driven by a push-pull buffer (on chip terminating resistor means
732
,
733
) complementarily so as to keep the sending side chip end of the transmission path
710
from being open.
However, the above first conventional I/O interface circuit has such a problem that a terminating resistor is required to be provided on the board to prevent reflection by an open end thereby producing a high cost.
Although in the respective examples shown in
FIGS. 2A-2E
, the description is made on an assumption of transmission of a signal in a single direction between two semiconductor chips, in case of both-way transmission of a signal between two semiconductor chips, the terminating resistor is required to be inserted in the vicinity of each semiconductor chip (parallel termination). This reason is that if signal transmission is carried out from the second semiconductor chip
2
to the first semiconductor chip
1
, the side of the first semiconductor chip
1
becomes an open end so that a distortion of waveform due to reflection occurs. In such a parallel termination, in the conventional example, two terminating resistors are needed on the board.
Further, in an ordinary system, as well as a point-to-point connection shown in the conventional example, branch/stub connections each having a branch in transmission path have been widely used. In this case, if the parallel termination is carried out to prevent reflection by the open end, in the conventional example, a same number of terminating resistors as that of semiconductor chips are required to be mounted on the board.
In the aforementioned patent case, the terminating resistors
711
-
714
on the transmission path cannot be removed.
As described above, if it is intended to realize a high speed I/O interface circuit with terminating system according to the conventional art, it is necessary to provide the terminating resistors on the board. Thus, there is a problem in system cost and the like.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Accordingly, the present invention has been made to solve the above problem, and therefore an object of the invention is to provide a low cost I/O interface circuit not necessitating the provision of terminating resistor on a board. Another object of the present invention is to provide a semiconductor chip capable of automatically performing impedance matching between the push-pull buffer and transmission path, and a semiconductor system loaded with a plurality of the semiconductor chips.
To achieve the above object, there is provided an I/O interface circuit comprising a push-pull output buffer having: a first driving element connected between an I/O node connected to an external circuit through a transmission path and a first potential node to which a first potential is applied; and a second driving element connected between a second potential node to which a second potential is applied and the I/O node, wherein on/off status of the first and second driving elements are controlled corresponding to an input mode for inputting a signal from the external circuit and an output mode for outputting a signal to the external circuit through the transmission path, the I/O interface circuit being further so constructed that the first or second potential is terminal potential and when the input mode is selected, a driving element connected to a potential node to which the terminal potential is applied, of the first and second driving elements, is controlled so as to be turned on.
According to the first aspect of the invention, because the driving element connected to the potential node to which the terminating potential of the push-pull output buffer in input mode is applied is controlled so as to be always on, the driving element acts as a terminating element on the transmission path thereby absorbing a reflection of a signal on the transmission path.
Further, to achieve the above object, there
Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba
Lam Tuan T.
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