Care And Cleaning Of Compression Connectors; Figure A-1 Identifying The Bristled Pad Of The Compression Connector - Silicon Graphics Octane2 Duo Installation Manual

A.
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Appendix A

Care and Cleaning of Compression Connectors

The Silicon Graphics Octane2 workstation uses compression connectors to connect
several modules and boards to the frontplane.
A single compression connector is used in the Octane2 workstation:
• On the back of the PCI module
• On each XIO board on the XIO module
Two compression connectors are used on the system module.
The compression connector has 96 pads that enable passage of signals between the
system (via the frontplane) and the system module, PCI module, or XIO board.
The compression connector has two halves: One half is located on the frontplane of the
chassis; the other, on the system module, PCI module, or XIO board. Each pad on a
frontplane connector is a flat, gold-plated surface. Each pad on the system module, PCI
module, or XIO board is composed of hundreds of tiny bristles (dendrites), as shown in
Figure A-1. When a bristled pad is pressed into a gold-plated pad, a connection is created
for one signal.
Bristled pad
Figure A-1 Identifying the Bristled Pad of the Compression Connector
The bristled pads may attract and hold dust, lint, grease, powder, and dirt. The presence
of these substances clogs or damages the bristles and prevents them from making proper
contact with the gold-plated pads on the system's frontplane. It is important to prevent
this.
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