asimlink
Full Member level 1
Hi Group,
I have been designing my low to medium speed (below 1Gbps or 2.5Gbps) pcbs in Atlium Designer using FR4 material. I found Altium Designer as very easy and very smart tool when it comes to schematic design, pcb layout design, pin swapping, parameter management, output file generation.
I need to design a board in which I will have a Xilinx Virtex-7 series FPGA and will require 10Gbps serial differential (MGT) interfaces. I will need to run these multiple serial differential interfaces to an onboard device. I am looking here for some answers to my following questions:
1. I have read at some forums that Altium is not a good tool as it does not provide realtime signal integrity and power integrity analysis for above Gbps desings and it also does not provides good characteristic impedance calculations for differential signals. Also found that it is poor in definition of high speed pcb layout rules.
I would like to know can i still use Altium for 10Gbps serial designs by any means (such as by use of external calculators etc) but without any much spent time on external calculations? Are there any perticular pcb design examples that show that Altium was used for above 10Gbps pcb design?
2. If altium is not a good tool for high speed pcb design, should I move to Cadence Allegro or to Mentor tools?
3. What real advantage Cadence or Mentor tools will give me over altium when it comes to High speed pcb design?
4. If detailed routing guidelines are available, do you think the pcb design may avoid SI and PI simulations and analysis cycle for a high speed PCB?
5. How do I select best material for my high speed pcb design.
Regards,
Asim
I have been designing my low to medium speed (below 1Gbps or 2.5Gbps) pcbs in Atlium Designer using FR4 material. I found Altium Designer as very easy and very smart tool when it comes to schematic design, pcb layout design, pin swapping, parameter management, output file generation.
I need to design a board in which I will have a Xilinx Virtex-7 series FPGA and will require 10Gbps serial differential (MGT) interfaces. I will need to run these multiple serial differential interfaces to an onboard device. I am looking here for some answers to my following questions:
1. I have read at some forums that Altium is not a good tool as it does not provide realtime signal integrity and power integrity analysis for above Gbps desings and it also does not provides good characteristic impedance calculations for differential signals. Also found that it is poor in definition of high speed pcb layout rules.
I would like to know can i still use Altium for 10Gbps serial designs by any means (such as by use of external calculators etc) but without any much spent time on external calculations? Are there any perticular pcb design examples that show that Altium was used for above 10Gbps pcb design?
2. If altium is not a good tool for high speed pcb design, should I move to Cadence Allegro or to Mentor tools?
3. What real advantage Cadence or Mentor tools will give me over altium when it comes to High speed pcb design?
4. If detailed routing guidelines are available, do you think the pcb design may avoid SI and PI simulations and analysis cycle for a high speed PCB?
5. How do I select best material for my high speed pcb design.
Regards,
Asim