Patent ID: 7182643

Claim:
An electrical connector, comprising: a first row of electrical contacts, comprising a first differential signal pair, the first differential signal pair comprising two broadside-coupled electrical signal contacts positioned along a first row centerline and on opposite sides of a first column centerline, the first column centerline positioned perpendicular to the first row centerline; a second differential signal pair comprising two broadside coupled electrical signal contacts positioned on opposite sides of a second column centerline, the second column centerline positioned parallel to the first column centerline and perpendicular to the first row centerline; a third differential signal pair comprising two broadside-coupled electrical signal contacts that are positioned on opposite sides of a third column centerline, the third column centerline positioned parallel to the second column centerline and perpendicular to the first row centerline; wherein (i) the first column centerline is adjacent to the second column centerline and the second column centerline is adjacent to the third column centerline, (ii) the first, second, and third differential signal pairs are evenly spaced apart by a fixed column-spacing distance measured from the first column centerline to the second column centerline; (iii) a fixed gap distance is defined between the respective two broadside coupled electrical contacts that form each of the first, second and third differential signal pairs; (iv) an aspect ratio of the fixed column-spacing distance to the fixed gap distance is approximately eight to ten; (v) a differential impedance of the differential signal pairs is matched to a system impedance, plus or minus ten ohms, at data transfer rates of 1 Gigabit/sec and 10 Gigabits/sec; and (vi) the electrical connector is devoid of shields between the first differential signal pair and the second differential signal pair.