System and method for temperature cycling
AssigneeNVIDIA Corporation
InventorsKyung Mo Shin, Thomas McMullen, Dong Wook Kim
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Abstract
A system and method for non-isothermal temperature cycling (also called Conduction Temperature Cycling) of a semiconductor device. The method includes inserting a semiconductor device into a testing chamber and thermally coupling the semiconductor device to a heating and cooling element via a vacuum holding component. The method further includes heating and cooling a die portion of the semiconductor device with the heating and cooling element and testing the semiconductor device for component failure caused by thermo-mechanical stress induced by the non-isothermal temperature cycling. In one embodiment, the heating and cooling comprises non-isothermal temperature cycling.
Claims20
A method of testing a semiconductor device comprising:
- loading said semiconductor device into a testing chamber;
- thermally coupling said semiconductor device to a heating and cooling element via a vacuum holding component;
- heating and cooling a die portion of said semiconductor device with said heating and cooling element, wherein said heating and cooling comprises non-isothermal temperature cycling;
- and
- testing said semiconductor device for component failure caused by thermo-mechanical stress induced by said non-isothermal temperature cycling.
A testing system comprising:
- means for thermally coupling a plurality of semiconductor devices, wherein said means for thermally coupling is operable to thermally couple a plurality of different semiconductor device designs;
- means for repeatedly transferring thermal energy to and from said plurality of semiconductor devices, wherein said transferring of thermal energy is operable to cause non-isothermal temperature cycling;
- and
- means for testing said plurality of semiconductor devices for thermo-mechanical failure.
A system for testing a plurality of semiconductor devices comprising:
- a plurality of heating and cooling elements operable to non-uniformly heat and cool said plurality of semiconductor devices;
- a plurality of thermal coupling elements operable to thermally couple said plurality of semiconductor devices to said plurality of heating and cooling elements;
- and
- a plurality of testing elements operable to detect thermo-mechanical failure of each of said plurality of semiconductor devices.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.