Patent ID: 7750644

Claim:
A plasma reactor system, comprising: a reactor chamber and a support pedestal in the chamber for holding a workpiece; plural power applicators; plural power generators, at least respective ones of said plural power generators coupled to at least respective ones of said plural power applicators; plural voltage or current sensors, at least respective ones of said plural voltage or current sensors coupled to said at least respective ones of said power applicators and to said support pedestal; plural comparators, at least respective ones of said plural comparators coupled to the at least respective ones of said voltage or current sensors, said at least respective ones of said comparators associated with respective comparison thresholds; a programmable controller programmed to carry out the steps of: (a) storing a process recipe comprising plural steps; (b) updating the respective thresholds of the at least respective ones of said comparators with respective updated thresholds for different ones of the steps of said process recipe; and (c) responding to an arc detection flag from one of said comparators by deactivating said at least respective ones of said plural power generators; communication channel apparatus coupled between said programmable controller and each of said at least respective ones of said comparators, wherein said controller is programmed to (a) update the respective thresholds by transmitting said updated thresholds to the at least respective ones of said comparators through said communication channel apparatus and (b) receive arc detection flags from said at least respective ones of said comparators through said communication channel apparatus; respective on/off control interfaces coupled to said at least respective ones of said plural power generators, said communication channel apparatus being further coupled between said programmable controller and said respective on/off control interfaces; and wherein each of said comparators is responsive to a unique device address, and wherein said controller is programmed to send a respective updated threshold to the corresponding comparator by transmitting the device address of the corresponding comparator with the updated threshold on said communication channel apparatus.