Jitter testing for gigabit serial communication transceivers

Abstract

Proper testing of transceivers requires the ability not only to measure generated jitter but also to inject in-band as well as out-of-band jitter for an appropriate receiver tolerance test. The article introduces a low-cost method to extend jitter testing to conventional external loop-back testing (looping the transmitted signal back to its own receiver) or golden device testing (using a known good device to test its link partner). The technique introduced is independent of test platforms.