A 1.4-pJ/b, power-scalable 16×12-Gb/s source-synchronous I/O with DFE receiver in 32nm SOI CMOS technology

A power-scalable 2-Byte I/O operating at 12-Gb/s per lane is reported. The I/O includes controllable TX driver amplitude, flexible RX equalization, and multiple deskew modes. This allows power reduction when operating over low-loss, low-skew interconnects, while at the same time supporting higher-loss channels. Measurements of a test chip fabricated in 32nm SOI CMOS technology demonstrate 1.4-pJ/b efficiency over 0.75” Megtron-6 PCB traces, and 1.9-pJ/b efficiency over 20” Megtron-6 PCB traces.