Patent ID: 7115892

Claim:
An apparatus for inspecting particles or defects comprising: illuminating means for irradiating light to an object under inspection; light detecting means for detecting reflected light or scattered light from the object under inspection; detecting means for detecting particles or defects based on a signal detected by the light detecting means; dimension measuring means for processing the signal to measure a size of each particle or defect; data processing means for processing an inspection result; and display means for displaying information on the inspection result, wherein the data processing means relates a particle or defect size to a cause of failure to estimate a cause of failure from statistical processing on the inspection result, and the display means displays information on the estimated cause of failure, wherein the data processing means matches the particle or defect sizes measured by the dimension measuring means with information on pass/fail of the object under inspection acquired by an electric inspection to calculate an influence of the particles or the defects on a yield, and the display means displays a calculation result.