As performance requirements and resulting signaling speeds continue to rise, maintaining signal and power integrity in single-ended signaling systems becomes increasingly challenging. Major hurdles include crosstalk, power supply noise, simultaneous switching output (SSO) noise and VREF noise. By employing differential signaling instead of single-ended signaling, designers are able to achieve faster signaling speeds at lower power consumption with greater immunity to system noise.

Differential Rambus Signaling Levels (DRSL) is a bi-directional, differential signaling standard offering a high-performance, low-power, and cost-effective solution for getting bandwidth on and off chip. DRSL signals are point-to-point and use an ultra-low 200mV signal swing (1.0 to 1.2 V). DRSL also enables low power operation and scalability for future reductions in voltage swing.

Who Benefits?

System and board designers alike benefit from the reduced cost resulting from the reduction in board layers and power and ground pins as well as the increased achievable system bandwidth. End users see marked improvements in power consumption and overall performance in their devices.