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Zynq-7000 PCB Design Guide
24
UG933 (v1.8) November 7, 2014
Chapter 3:
Power Distribution System
Plane Inductance
Some inductance is associated with the PCB power and ground planes. The geometry of
these planes determines their inductance.
Current spreads out as it flows from one point to another (due to a property similar to skin
effect) in the power and ground planes. Inductance in planes can be described as spreading
inductance and is specified in units of henries per square. The square is dimensionless; the
shape of a section of a plane, not the size, determines the amount of inductance.
Spreading inductance acts like any other inductance and resists changes to the amount of
current in a power plane (the conductor). The inductance retards the capacitor’s ability to
respond to a device’s transient currents and should be reduced as much as possible.
Because the designer’s control over the X-Y shape of the plane can be limited, the only
controllable factor is the spreading inductance value. This is determined by the thickness of
the dielectric separating a power plane from its associated ground plane.
For high-frequency power distribution systems, power and ground planes work in pairs,
with their inductances coexisting dependently with each other. The spacing between the
power and ground planes determines the pair’s spreading inductance. The closer the
spacing (the thinner the dielectric), the lower the spreading inductance. Approximate values
of spreading inductance for different thicknesses of FR4 dielectric are shown in
.
Decreased spreading inductance corresponds to closer spacing of V
CC
and GND planes.
When possible, place the V
CC
planes directly adjacent to the GND planes in the PCB stackup.
Facing V
CC
and GND planes are sometimes referred to as sandwiches. While the use of V
CC
– GND sandwiches was not necessary in the past for previous technologies (lead frames,
wire bond packages), the speeds involved and the sheer amount of power required for fast,
dense devices often demand it.
However, because of the presence of substrate decoupling capacitors in Zynq-7000 AP SoC
devices, there is a limit to the amount of fast transient current demanded from PCB
decoupling capacitors. This means that there is little benefit from dielectric thicknesses
below 50µ (2 mil). Dielectric thickness of 50µ or 75µ between V
CC
and GND layers is
sufficient for Zynq-7000 AP SoC devices.
Besides offering a low-inductance current path, power-ground sandwiches also offer some
high-frequency decoupling capacitance. As the plane area increases and as the separation
Table 3-4:
Capacitance and Spreading Inductance Values for Different Thicknesses of FR4
Power-Ground Plane Sandwiches
Dielectric Thickness
Inductance
Capacitance
(micron)
(mil)
(pH/square)
(pF/in2)
(pF/cm2)
102
4
130
225
35
51
2
65
450
70
25
1
32
900
140