The PCI Express flying lead probe is designed for simplicity, flexibility and low cost, said Rob Vezina, a PCI Express product marketing engineer at Agilent. It cleanly captures 8.0 GT/s traces from the device under test while it eliminates the need to buy more expensive solder-down probes that contain wires that are unused for the testing application.
Other probes on the market come equipped with 16, unmappable leads, resulting in unused leads that increase the price of the probe, even though they are not useful for today’s most common channel tests. Agilent’s U4324A flying lead probe can be used for bidirectional lane widths as narrow as x2, making it the most cost-effective solution for capturing 8 GT/s traces in the industry. It was designed with the needs of silicon, system and embedded PC connector testing in mind.
What’s more, it can map any unused cable to replace a lead that is damaged or broken. Finally, the probe provides an additional line for connection to an external reference clock, and it supports 2.5-GT/s, 5-GT/s and 8-GT/s PCI Express IO speeds.
The most delicate part of any solder-down probe is the tip. To further reduce the cost of testing, Agilent’s U4324A PCI Express 3.0 flying lead probe works with Agilent’s low-cost, replaceable N5426A ZIF (zero insertion force) tip kit. Each of the four probe leads can then plug into the expendable ZIF tip, which is then soldered to the channel on the device under test. The kit allows users to easily replace tips as necessary, ensuring the long life of the Agilent U4324 flying lead solder-down probe.