Patent ID: 6952104

Claim:
An inspection apparatus comprising: an inspection-signal supply terminal adapted to be disposed on one of the surfaces of a circuit board formed with a plurality of conductive patterns to be inspected, said conductive patterns being arranged such that the contact terminals of said conductive patterns are disposed parallel to each other, and arranged at a fine pitch with the distance between each of said conductive patterns being equal, so as to supply an inspection signal to each of said conductive patterns therethrough, said inspection-signal supply terminal having a width equal to or less than that of the layout pitch of said conductive patterns; scanning means for scanningly moving said inspection-signal supply terminal across and inspection-signal supply region including respective portions of said conductive patterns; from each of said conductive patterns in response to said inspection signal supplied from said a sensor section adapted to be disposed on the other surface of said circuit board of at least at a position opposed to said inspection-signal supply terminal so as to detect a signal from each of said conductive patterns in response to said inspection signal supplied from said inspection- signal terminal to each of said conductive patterns, said sensor section having a width equal to or greater than that three times greaterr than the layout pitch of said conductive patterns; signal control means for feeding the inspection signal to said inspection-signal supply terminal being scanningly moved by said scanning means, and picking up the detected signal from said sensor section disposed on the other surface of said circuit board; and determination means for determining if each of said conductive patterns supplied with the inspection signal includes a short-circuit, according to whether the level of said detected signal picked up by said signal control means is different from a signal level in a normal state.