“The power of the XJTAG system has to be seen to be believed and that’s why we are launching this new test service,” says Simon Payne, chief executive officer of XJTAG. “It will enable us to demonstrate, on a bonafide development board, how, by using the JTAG chain and writing and then reusing test scripts, printed circuits can be tested and debugged in hours/days as opposed to weeks with other competitive systems.”
XJTAG can test a high proportion of a printed circuit including JTAG and non-JTAG devices such as BGA (ball grid array) and chip scale devices, SDRAMs, Ethernet controllers, video interfaces, flash memories, FPGAs (Field Programmable Gate Arrays), microprocessors and many other devices.
“Board designers and developers are still unaware of the capability of boundary scan systems and the fact that they provide a cost-effective solution particularly for smaller, more tightly packed circuit boards with less test points and an increasing proportion of JTAG-compliant chips,” added Simon Payne. “This service will enable companies at no cost to themselves to see what they have been missing.”
The powerful and easy-to-use XJTAG Development System provides a fully-integrated environment which can migrate seamlessly through the product life cycle from early design to field support and repair. XJTAG enables circuit designers to shorten the development cycle and prototyping process by facilitating early test development, early design validation of CAD netlists, fast generation of highly functional tests and test re-use across circuits that utilise the same devices.
XJTAG test scripts are also re-usable and portable across different boards due to the novel device-centric approach that the designers have adopted. Re-usable device tests and the abstraction of device tests from both circuit detail and complexity of JTAG (Joint Test Action Group), mean that designers can quickly develop systems to debug elements of their designs and to functionally test early prototypes.
About XJTAG (www.xjtag.com)
XJTAG Limited is a specialist design and test tool developer. Its JTAG (Joint Test Action Group) development system offers a competitive solution for designers and developers of electronic circuits. Utilising XJTAG allows circuit development and prototyping process to be shortened significantly by facilitating early test development, early design validation, fast development of functional tests and test re-use across circuits that utilise the same devices. The company is based in the U.K. at The Irwin Centre, Dry Drayton, Cambridge, U.K. and has a global network of distributors which includes DiagnoSYS in North America.
About the Cambridge Technology Group (www.cambridgetechgroup.com)
Cambridge Technology Group is a holding company with three wholly owned subsidiaries – Adiabatic Logic Limited, Cambridge Technology Consultants Limited and XJTAG Limited. Adiabatic Logic (www.adiabaticlogic.com) was set up to exploit a portfolio of secured patents in the low power technology arena. Adiabatic Logic’s patented Intelligent Output Driver (IOD), launched in May 2003, delivers significant (up to 75%) power savings in chip I/O for portable devices such as laptop computers, personal digital assistants (PDAs), MP3 players and smartphones. Cambridge Technology Consultants (www.camtechconsultants.com) offers its clients companies such as ARM, AT&T, BOC Edwards, Celoxica, Co-operative Group, Fujitsu, Marconi, Mitsubishi Electric and IPWireless a broad range of services from high-end applications to innovative product development and technical consultancy skills. For ten years, its multi disciplinary team of hardware and software engineers have provided cost-effective solutions from concept through to pre-production.
What is JTAG?
Advances in silicon design, such as increasing device density and, more recently, ball grid array (BGA) and chip scale packaging, have reduced the efficacy of traditional electronic circuit testing methods. In order to overcome these problems and others; some of the world’s leading silicon manufacturers combined to form the Joint Test Action Group (JTAG). The findings of this group were used as the basis for the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) standard 1149.1: Standard Test Access Port and Boundary Scan Architecture and subsequently the Standard became known as JTAG.
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