Patent ID: 7931474

Claim:
A high speed connector, comprising: a wafer of connector elements, the wafer supporting first and second columns of conductive terminals, each of the terminals including a contact portion, a tail portion and a body portion interconnecting the contact and tail portions together, the terminals in each column supported by a plurality of ribs, the first and second columns of terminals being configured so that a terminal from the first column and the second column form a row, wherein a first row of terminals are broadside coupled to form a first terminal pair that is separated by a space and a second row of terminals are broadside coupled to form a second terminal pair separated by the space, wherein the space between the terminals that form terminal pairs is filled with a dielectric, and wherein an air channel is provided between the first and second terminal pair such that the first and second terminal pair are separated by an air channel that extends substantially along a path between the first and second terminal pairs, the air channel providing increased electrical separation between the first and second terminal pairs, the air channel being traversed by at least one of the plurality of ribs, wherein the wafer is formed from a first half and a second half and the air channel is formed from a slot in the first half and a slot in the second half.