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February 5, 2008 -- At DesignCon 2008, FCI has introduced its MezzSelect product portfolio, designed to help designers of printed circuit board assemblies complete mezzanine designs faster, more easily, and with less risk. The product portfolio consists of a number of mezzanine connectors addressing markets including high-speed data-networking, industrial, instrumentation, telecommunications and medical electronics applications.
As part of the product launch, FCI's online MezzSelect product selector allows designers to choose a product based on a number of different factors, including contact pitch, module size, operating transmission speed, density, termination style and stack height. Finding the right product for a specific application is easy via the use of the Web-based product selector, says the company, along with design tools such as drawings, models, SPICE files and datasheets. Based on mechanical and electrical selection criteria, the company contends that the MezzSelect product selector allows for quick and easy selection of the board-stacking connectors that best suit an application.
"FCI has become the partner of choice for mezzanine products," comments Rob Poort, global product portfolio director, board-to-board products, FCI. "The MezzSelect product selector reduces the complexity that mezzanine interconnect designs bring and reduces lead time with instant access to technical information on each connector."
FCI says the MezzSelect portfolio allows designers to optimize the cost and performance of the connectors that they choose for their designs and maximize the space on printed circuit boards. The product portfolio incorporates many of FCI's connectors brands including the MEGArray, GIGArray, Bergstak, Conan, Ribcage, Minitek, Bergstik and Dubox lines.
New to the MezzSelect portfolio, and also introduced at DesignCon, is the FCI TwinMezz board-stacking connector, designed to bring ultra-high density to mezzanine applications while exhibiting next-generation, high-speed electrical performance. According to the company, the TwinMezz system packs 25 high-speed differential signal pairs into a square centimeter, or 161 signal pairs in a square inch of board area, for a significantly higher margin of density than comparable products on the market.
A hermaphroditic design allows the TwinMezz connector to mate to itself, significantly reducing the number of part variations needed to accomplish a range of different stack heights. Current plans are to support 6 different connector heights to offer 20 different stack heights in the range of 12 mm to 40 mm. Planned options for 2, 4, or 6 differential signal pairs per column will provide capability for circuit counts ranging from 80 to 800 contact positions, and to tailor the connector width to fit available board space.
FCI says the TwinMezz connectors also exhibit very well-matched impedance, low insertion loss, and low crosstalk, which make them well-suited for applications in very high speed environments. Th connector's open pin field structure, building on the same edge-coupled technology used in FCI's AirMax VS high-speed connector system, allows for custom pin assignments, so that speed and signal density can be optimized. With optimized wiring patterns, transmission rates of 25 Gbit/sec or higher are achievable.
The TwinMezz connectors also feature FCI's patented BGA connector termination for easy attachment to printed circuit boards using conventional reflow soldering processes. The TwinMezz connector system will be further developed during the 1st half of 2008 and, when in production, the product line will be part of FCI's MezzSelect product portfolio.
More information about FCI's MezzSelect product portfolio can be found at www.fci.com/mezzselect.
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