Patent ID: 7723649

Claim:
A vacuum thermal processing system, comprising: a process chamber; a gas distribution system and a gas heater system coupled to the process chamber and constructed to provide heated gas to the process chamber; a vacuum flange coupled to the process chamber, the vacuum flange designed to be coupled to a pumping system; at least one substrate holder contained within the process chamber configured to hold at least one substrate for each of the at least one substrate holder; a heater coupled to the process chamber, the heater configured to heat any substrate present on the at least one substrate holder, the heater further configured to heat at least one wall of the process chamber; and a gas injector system contained within the process chamber, the gas injector system coupled to the gas distribution system to receive heated gas therefrom and configured in a way so as to flow the heated gas in an essentially planar fashion to a face surface of the substrate so as to uniformly heat the substrate.