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A Multi-Chip Module (MCM) is a specialized electronic package where multiple integrated circuit
Integrated circuit

In electronics, an integrated circuit is a miniaturized electronic circuit that has been manufactured in the surface of a thin Wafer of semiconductor material....
s (ICs), semiconductor dies or other modules are packaged in such a way as to facilitate their use as a single IC. The MCM itself will often be referred to as a "chip" in designs, thus illustrating its integrated nature.

i-Chip Modules come in a variety of forms depending on the complexity and development philosophies of their designers.






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Power5
A Multi-Chip Module (MCM) is a specialized electronic package where multiple integrated circuit
Integrated circuit

In electronics, an integrated circuit is a miniaturized electronic circuit that has been manufactured in the surface of a thin Wafer of semiconductor material....
s (ICs), semiconductor dies or other modules are packaged in such a way as to facilitate their use as a single IC. The MCM itself will often be referred to as a "chip" in designs, thus illustrating its integrated nature.

Overview

Multi-Chip Modules come in a variety of forms depending on the complexity and development philosophies of their designers. These can range from using pre-packaged ICs on a small printed circuit board
Printed circuit board

A printed circuit board, or PCB, is used to mechanically support and electrically connect electronic components using Conductor pathways, or signal traces, industrial etchinged from copper sheets laminated onto a non-conductive substrate....
 (PCB) meant to mimic the package footprint of an existing chip package to fully custom chip packages integrating many chip dies on a High Density Interconnection (HDI) substrate.

Multi-Chip Module packaging is an important facet of modern electronic miniaturization and micro-electronic systems. MCMs are classified according to the technology used to create the HDI (High Density Interconnection) substrate.

  • MCM-L - laminated MCM. The substrate is a multi-layer laminated PCB (Printed circuit board
    Printed circuit board

    A printed circuit board, or PCB, is used to mechanically support and electrically connect electronic components using Conductor pathways, or signal traces, industrial etchinged from copper sheets laminated onto a non-conductive substrate....
    ).
  • MCM-D - deposited MCM. The modules are deposited on the base substrate using thin film technology.
  • MCM-C - ceramic substrate MCMs, such as LTCC
    Low temperature co-fired ceramic

    Low temperature co-fired ceramic is a well-established multi-layer technology which has been in use for many years in the microelectronics packaging industry....
    .


Chip stack MCMs


A relatively new development in MCM technology is the so-called "chip-stack" package. Certain ICs, memories in particular, have very similar or identical pinouts when used multiple times within systems. A carefully designed substrate can allow these dies to be stacked in a vertical configuration making the resultant MCM's footprint much smaller (albeit at the cost of a thicker or taller chip). Since area is more often at a premium in miniature electronics designs, the chip-stack is an attractive option in many applications such as cell phones and personal digital assistant
Personal digital assistant

A personal digital assistant is a handheld computer, also known as a palmtop computer. Newer PDAs also have both color screens and audio capabilities, enabling them to be used as mobile phones, , web browsers, or portable media players....
s (PDAs).

Examples of MCM technologies

  • IBM
    IBM

    International Business Machines Corporation, abbreviated IBM and nicknamed "Big Blue" , is a multinational corporation computer technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, New York, United States....
     Bubble memory
    Bubble memory

    Bubble memory is a type of non-volatile memory computer memory that uses a thin film of a magnetic material to hold small magnetized areas, known as bubbles or domains, which each store one bit of data....
     MCMs (1970s)
  • Intel Pentium Pro
    Pentium Pro

    The Pentium Pro is a sixth-generation x86-based microprocessor developed and manufactured by Intel introduced in November 1995. It introduced the Intel P6 and was originally intended to replace the original Pentium in a full range of applications....
    , Pentium D
    Pentium D

    The Pentium D brand refers to two series of desktop dual-core 64-bit x86 CPU with the NetBurst microarchitecture manufactured by Intel Corporation....
     Presler , Xeon
    Xeon

    The Xeon brand refers to many families of Intel Corporation's x86 architecture multiprocessing Central processing units ? for dual processor and multi-processor configuration on a single motherboard targeted at non-consumer markets of server and workstation computers, and also at blade servers and embedded systems....
     Dempsey and Clovertown, and Core 2 Quad (Kentsfield and Yorkfield)
  • Sony
    Sony

    is a multinational corporation list of conglomerates corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan, and one of the world's largest media conglomerates with revenue exceeding US$99.1 billion ....
     memory stick
    Memory Stick

    Memory Stick is a removable flash memory memory card format, launched by Sony in October 1998 , and is also used in general to describe the whole family of Memory Sticks....
    s
  • Xenos, a GPU
    Graphics processing unit

    A graphics processing unit or GPU is a dedicated graphics rendering device for a personal computer, workstation, or game console. Modern GPUs are very efficient at manipulating and displaying computer graphics, and their highly parallel structure makes them more effective than general-purpose Central processing unit for a range of com...
     designed by ATI Technologies
    ATI Technologies

    ATI Technologies Inc. was a major designer and supplier of graphics processing units and motherboard chipsets. In 2006, the company was acquired by Advanced Micro Devices and was renamed the AMD Graphics Product Group, although the ATI brand was retained for graphics cards....
     for the Xbox 360
    Xbox 360

    The Xbox 360 is the second video game console produced by Microsoft, and the successor to the Xbox. The Xbox 360 competes with Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the History of video game consoles of video game consoles....
    , with eDRAM
    EDRAM

    eDRAM stands for "embedded system Dynamic Random Access Memory", a capacitor-based dynamic random access memory usually integrated on the same integrated circuit or in the same Multi-Chip Module as the main Application-specific integrated circuit or processor, as opposed to external DRAM modules and transistor-based static random access memor...
  • POWER2
    POWER2

    The IBM POWER2 microprocessor was released in 1993 as the successor of the POWER1. The POWER2 ran from 55 to 71.5 MHz and improved on the POWER1 design by featuring an extra Arithmetic Logic Unit and floating point unit, increased cache sizes and new instructions....
    , POWER4
    POWER4

    The POWER4 chip is a CPU that implements the 64-bit PowerPC Power Architecture. Released in 2001, the POWER4 chip is based on the previous POWER3 chip design....
     and POWER5
    POWER5

    POWER5 is a microprocessor developed and fabricated by IBM. It is an improved variant of the highly successful POWER4. The principal improvements are support for simultaneous multithreading and an Semiconductor-die cutting memory controller....
     from IBM
    IBM

    International Business Machines Corporation, abbreviated IBM and nicknamed "Big Blue" , is a multinational corporation computer technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, New York, United States....


See also

  • System in package
    System in package

    A system-in-a-package or system in package , also known as a Chip Stack Multi-Chip Module, is a number of integrated circuits enclosed in a single package or module....
  • Hybrid integrated circuit


External links

  • Multi-Chip Modules