Intel Corporation

Ziv Shmuely

Tsvika Kurts

Alex Waizman

Marcelo Yuffe

Ofer Ginzberg

Eugene Avner

According to various embodiments, a differential transmitter includes a driver and a predriver. In various embodiments, the predriver may include pull-up transistors and pull-down transistors configured in various ways to produce a staged output signal during a pull-up transition, wherein the higher bits of the input signal are switched slower in comparison with the lower bits of the input signal, while at the same time maintaining the simultaneous pull-down transition among all the bits. In various embodiments, the staged output of a predriver may further be dynamically disabled during a deemphasis exit transition. Other embodiments may be described and claimed.

Staged predriver for high speed differential transmitter

Methods and systems provide for a semiconductor die that is compatible with a wide variety of industry standard sockets, where each type of socket is identified by a different pin map. In one embodiment, the die has a plurality of signal lines, one or more surface contacts and one or more signal selectors coupled to the signal lines and the surface contacts. Each signal selector electrically connects one of the signal lines to one of the surface contacts based on a programming signal. In a particularl embodiment, each signal selector includes a multiplexer and a fuse element, where the multiplexer routes one of its input ports to its output port based on a programming value of the fuse element. The programming value can be set by the programming signal.

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Haifa, Israel

Ziv Shmuely