ScanWorks Supports Intel Silicon View Technology
June 13, 2013. With the introduction last week of Intel Silicon View Technology (Intel SVT), ASSET InterTech’s ScanWorks platform became a platform that fully supports all three aspects of the new validation, debug, and test capabilities that Intel is embedding into its processors and chipsets.
Based on ASSET’s nine-year collaboration with Intel as a third-party solutions provider, ScanWorks now supports Intel SVT in both the processors and chipsets that are enabled with this technology. Intel SVT is an on-chip DFx (design for debug, test, or validation) set of capabilities that addresses the challenges designers and manufacturers must overcome when faced with shorter development cycles, shrinking form-factors and greater performance expectations in tighter power envelopes. Intel SVT is a key Intel strategy to support embedded instruments.
“Our long history of working alongside Intel to anticipate the needs of designers and manufacturers has served us well with regards to supporting Intel SVT as soon as it is available,” said Tim Caffee, ASSET’s vice president of design validation and test. “The combination of our ScanWorks tools and Intel’s embedded capabilities creates a very rich environment wherein engineers can quickly debug, validate and test a platform’s operations while diagnosing problem areas.”
Specifically, ScanWorks HSIO tools work with the Intel SVT electrical validation capabilities to measure and optimize operational timing and voltage margins on high-speed data links and buses such as PCI Express Graphics, Direct Media Interface (DMI), and the DDR3/4 memory bus, all of which terminate in the processor or chipset. ScanWorks functions interactively with Intel SVT to investigate the root causes of low operating margins on these buses. In a board manufacturing test setting, ScanWorks Boundary-Scan Test (BST) and Processor-Controlled Test (PCT) function with Intel SVT to test and diagnose both structural and at-speed defects. Intel SVT and ScanWorks offer improved diagnostics by enabling at-speed tests for high-speed interfaces, thereby reducing dependencies on board functional test and providing test cost reduction opportunities.
ASSET recently took its first strategic step into the area of platform debug via JTAG-based firmware and BIOS debug tools when it became a reseller of the Intel Platform Debug Tool (PDT).