Protocol analyser supports PCIe 4.0 at 16GT/s speed

Article By : Teledyne LeCroy

The Summit T416 protocol analyser uses high speed Interposers capable of tapping any device under test.

Teledyne LeCroy's Summit T416 PCI Express protocol analyser meets the challenge of 16GT/s and has up to x16 lane width protocol analysis.

Featuring a memory buffer of 128GB, the Summit T416 protocol analyser can be controlled through USB for remote networked control through a 1000baseT Ethernet to a windows system. The protocol analyser can be synchronised with other high speed protocol analysers from Teledyne LeCroy.

The Summit T416 protocol analyser features the latest in storage protocol decoding including NVM Express (NVMe) and SATA Express. It is also the only protocol analyser to support the latest in NVMe management technology described in the NVM Express Management Interface (NVMe-MI) protocol specification. Some of the current PCIe analysers only support PCIe in-band capture for NVMe-MI but the Summit T416 can capture simultaneously in-band PCIe and out-of-band SMBus protocol traffic.

As PCIe systems move toward implementing IO virtualisation, the Summit T416 protocol analyser is fully capable of decoding and describing virtualised systems in a multitude of different configurations. The CATC Trace View, along with the recently added spreadsheet view, NVMe queue characterisation tables and LTSSM state views help users quickly come up to speed on how their devices and systems are behaving in real world environments. Developers that need to get down to the byte level and see traffic just before and after deskew can do it with the BitTracer feature, which records the bytes exactly as they come across the link, allowing debugging of PHY layer problems and combining the features of a logic analyser format with a decoded protocol analyser format.

The Summit T416 protocol analyser uses high speed interposers capable of tapping any device under test (DUT). These interposers utilise Teledyne LeCroy's T.A.P.4 technology that ensures transparent acquisition of 16GT/s PCIe transmission between hosts and devices. The interposers come in x1, x4, x8 and x16 lane widths that can cover testing requirements for all CEM connectors. In addition, Teledyne LeCroy is also releasing a PCIe 4.0 Test Platform that is a two CEM-socket active backplane with power supplies capable of supporting 16 GT/s bus transactions for testing CEM form factor devices. This test platform contains a high speed interposer that can capture traffic between the two CEM-socket. Ideally the test platform can be used for testing with the Summit Z416 protocol exerciser and the DUT.

The Summit T416 PCIe 4.0 protocol analyser, PCIe 4.0 x1, x4, x8, x16 interposers and PCIe 4.0 test platform are currently available to order.