Examination of the I-V curves of failed components, in particular semiconductor devices, reveal common failure mechanisms such as shorted or open pins due to Electrical Overstress, bonding problems, leakage currents due to internal contamination or damage and semiconductor surface inversions.   Thomson Lab Services has multiple manual curve tracers including manual TEK 576, digital TEK370 and a high power digital TEK371 curve tracer.  The Pin-to-Pin I-V Signature Analysis System is used for higher pin count components or repetitive measurements.           Instrumentation Details: The Pin-to-Pin I-V Signature Analysis System is composed of a TEK370A curve tracer coupled to a TFA-2200 relay multiplexer controlled by custom graphical Windows based software.  The system provides I-V curve comparisons of the device under test (DUT) to stored reference curves in manual or automatic mode.  The system can test 256 pins using a four level relay matrix.  The four levels allow simultaneous connection to the DUT of the curve tracer’s Collector, Emitter, Base and a fourth signal such as a Clock or a DC supply.  In fully automatic mode, the system scans through all the pins, measuring the current in each pin while at the same time comparing to an acceptance window and logging a pass or fail of the pin for the Analyst review.  In manual mode the analyst can step through the pins for individual review while applying thermal cycling to the DUT to reveal continuity intermittencies.  In either mode the analyst is able to store the plots as BMP format picture files.