Texas Instruments Corporation

Byron Harry Gibbs

Enis Tuncer

Michael Todd Wyant

Charles Allen Martin

Adolphus E McClanahan

Chi-Tsung Lee

Phillip H Ball

Bruce Randall Sult

Stanley Hsu

Jerry Hsu

In a described example, an apparatus includes: a process chamber configured for a pressure greater than one atmosphere, having a device chuck configured to support electronic devices that are mounted on package substrates and partially covered in mold compound, the electronic devices spaced from one another by saw streets; and a saw in the process chamber configured to cut through the mold compound and package substrates in the saw streets to separate the molded electronic devices one from another.

Hyperbaric saw for sawing packaged devices

A method of manufacturing a semiconductor package includes covering a semiconductor die and a plurality of conductive terminals coupled to the semiconductor die in a mold compound, positioning the mold compound between a first pair of electrodes and a second pair of electrodes, and moving a movable electrode of the first pair and a movable electrode of the second pair into a first clamping position. In the first clamping position, each of the first pair of electrodes and the second pair of electrodes electrically couples to a unique subset of the plurality of conductive terminals. The method also includes applying, by the first pair of electrodes, a first voltage to the semiconductor die within the mold compound; and applying, by the second pair of electrodes, a second voltage to the semiconductor die within the mold compound. The second voltage is less than the first voltage.

Testing semiconductor components

A method of testing a packaged semiconductor device under test (DUT) including a leadframe having a plurality of pins and at least one thermal pad with a semiconductor die having topside bond pads wire-bonded by bond wires to the plurality of pins and secured to the thermal pad. A leadframe sheet is provided including a plurality of packaged DUTs including support members that connect to the packaged DUTs. The thermal pads are shorted to one another, and the leadframe sheet is trimmed for electrically isolating the pins from one another. A first electrical contact is provided to the thermal pad. Active pins of the plurality of pins are electrically contacted with a contactor. Automatic testing identifies shorts between the active pins and the thermal pad.

Thermal pad shorts test for wire bonded strip testing

A contactor assembly for automated testing a device under test (DUT) that includes a plurality of separate electrodes including a first electrode includes a tester load board and a contactor body coupled to the tester load board. A plurality of contactor pins carried by the contactor body includes a first contactor pin and a second contactor pin that are electrically coupled to the tester load board. The tester load board is configured to couple the plurality of contactor pins to automatic test equipment (ATE) for testing the DUT. The first contactor pin and second contactor pin are positioned to both contact the first electrode. A first path to the first contactor pin and a second path to the second contactor pin are electrically shorted together by the contactor assembly to be electrically in parallel to provide redundant paths to the first electrode during automated testing of the DUT.

Contactor with multi-pin device contacts

Methods and devices are disclosed for cleaning contactors equipped with contact pins such as pogo pins include steps which may be performed in concert with common semiconductor device testing processes using automatic test equipment and associated handlers. The preferred embodiments of the invention include method steps for mounting a surrogate cleaning device in a tester load board socket and applying the contact pins associated with automatic test equipment to the surrogate cleaning device for cleaning.

Test handler automatic contactor cleaner methods and surrogate cleaning device

One embodiment of the present invention includes a method for reactively cleaning a contact mechanism. The method includes measuring contact resistance (CRES) associated with a plurality of electrical contacts of the contact mechanism. The method also includes generating at least one statistic of the measured CRES associated with the plurality of electrical contacts of the contact mechanism, and comparing the at least one statistic of the CRES associated with the plurality of electrical contacts of the contact mechanism with at least one CRES threshold parameter associated with an unacceptable level of CRES. The method further includes cleaning the plurality of electrical contacts of the contact mechanism based on the comparison of the at least one statistic of the CRES and the at least one CRES threshold parameter.

Contact mechanism cleaning

In one embodiment, a method for probing a wafer includes providing a plurality of pressure sensors on a surface of a probe card holding tray, positioning a probe card of a testhead relative to a prober supporting a wafer, engaging the probe card with the probe card holding tray, receiving a plurality of pressure signals from respective pressure sensors, and comparing the pressure signals to determine if the probe card is substantially parallel with the prober.

Growing community of inventors

McKinney, TX, United States of America

Byron Harry Gibbs