Patent ID: 7979754

Claim:
A method of testing a proximity communication circuit comprising a first chip including a data transmitter and one or more first capacitor pads connected to one or more data outputs of the data transmitter, and a second chip including a data receiver and one or more second capacitor pads connected to one or more data inputs of the data receiver, wherein the first and second chips are juxtaposed with the first capacitor pads aligned with respective ones of the second capacitor pads with dielectric therebetween to form capacitive coupling circuits between the first and second chips, and to form respective data links between the data outputs of the data transmitter and the data inputs of the data receiver, the method comprising the steps of: impressing and varying at least one test voltage of predetermined amplitude upon at least one respective node on respective ones of the data links; and monitoring the output of the data receiver as a function of the varying test voltage; wherein each of the data inputs of the data receiver is periodically refreshed by a respective refresh supply voltage applied to the data input during a quiescent period of data transmission, and wherein the impressing and varying step varies the refresh supply voltage between successive ones of the quiescent period.