Transmission Lines
The type of transmission line used to connect two devices (chips, modules) dictates the type of signaling to be used. Single-ended signaling is used with coaxial cables, in which one conductor totally screens the other from the environment. All screens (or shields) are combined into a single piece of material to form a common ground. Differential signaling is used with a balanced pair of conductors. For short cables and low frequencies, the two methods are equivalent, so cheap single-ended circuits with a common ground can be used with cheap cables. As signaling speeds become faster, wires begin to behave as transmission lines.
Read more about this topic: Differential Pair
Famous quotes containing the word lines:
“To understand
The signs that stars compose, we need depend
Only on stars that are entirely there
And the apparent space between them. There
Never need be lines between them, puzzling
Our sense of what is what.”
—John Hollander (b. 1929)