Recent advances in low voltage silicon germaniumand BiCMOS processes have allowed the design andproduction of very high speed amplifi ers. Because theprocesses are low voltage, most of the amplifi er designshave incorporated differential inputs and outputs to regainand maximize total output signal swing. Since many lowvoltageapplications are single-ended, the questions arise,“How can I use a differential I/O amplifi er in a single-endedapplication?” and “What are the implications of suchuse?” This Design Note addresses some of the practicalimplications and demonstrates specifi c single-endedapplications using the 3GHz gain-bandwidth LTC6406differential I/O amplifi er.
Calculation of the Differential Impedance of Tracks on FR4 substrates
There is a discrepancy between calculated and measured values of impedance for differential transmission lineson FR4. This is especially noticeable in the case of surface microstrip configurations. The anomaly is shown tobe due to the nature of the substrate material. This needs to be considered as a layered structure of epoxy resinand glass fibre. Calculations, using Boundary Element field methods, show that the distribution of the electricfield within this layered structure determines the apparent dielectric constant and therefore affects theimpedance. Thus FR4 cannot be considered to be uniform dielectric when calculating differential impedance.
