Brian McDermott, Director, OEM Marketing and Design, Isola Group
Steve McKinney, Technical Marketing Engineer, Mentor Graphics

For a majority of today's signal-integrity tools, the electrical properties of dielectrics, such as loss tangent and dielectric constant (Dk), are defined by a single value for each dielectric layer. FR4 is constructed from multiple glass/resin structures yielding significant variances in dielectric properties. To make the necessary tradeoffs in minimizing system cost while maintaining performance, it is important to understand these variances and model them accurately in simulation. This presentation will introduce improved inputs, methods, and analysis techniques that will provide designers with the tools and information to make informed design and material choices while improving simulation accuracy.