The land grid array (LGA) is a type of surface-mount packaging for integrated circuits (ICs) that is notable for having the pins on the socket (when a socket is used) rather than the integrated circuit. An LGA can be electrically connected to a printed circuit board (PCB) either by the use of a socket or by soldering directly to the board.
The land grid array is a packaging technology with a rectangular grid of contacts on the underside of a package. The contacts are to be connected to a grid of contacts on the PCB. Not all rows and columns of the grid need to be used. The contacts can either be made by using an LGA socket, or by using solder paste.
LGA packaging is related to ball grid array (BGA) and pin grid array (PGA) packaging. Unlike pin grid arrays, land grid array packages are designed to fit either in a socket, or be soldered down using surface mount technology. PGA packages cannot be soldered down using surface mount technology. In contrast with a BGA, land grid array packages in non socketed configurations have no balls, and use flat contacts which are soldered directly to the PCB. BGA packages, however have balls as their contacts in between the IC and the PCBs. The balls are normally attached to the underside of the IC.
Microprocessors
LGA is used as a physical interface for microprocessors of the Intel Pentium, Intel Xeon, Intel Core and AMD Opteron, Threadripper and Epyc families. Unlike the pin grid array (PGA) interface found on most AMD and older Intel processors, there are no pins on the chip; in place of the pins are pads of bare gold-plated copper that touch protruding pins on the microprocessor’s connector on the motherboard. Compared to PGA CPUs, LGA reduces the likelihood of the chip being damaged either before or during installation as there are no pins that can be accidentally bent. By transferring the pins to the motherboard, it is possible to design the socket to physically shield the pins from damage, and the costs of installation damage can be mitigated as motherboards tend to be significantly cheaper than CPUs.
CPU Manufacturers
LGA packaging technology is used by both AMD and Intel.
AMD
- Socket F (LGA 1207)
- Socket C32 (LGA 1207) (replaces Socket F)
- Socket G34 (LGA 1944)
- Socket SP3 (LGA 4094)
- Socket TR4 (LGA 4094)
Intel
- LGA 771 (Socket J)
- LGA 775 (Socket T)
- LGA 1366 (Socket B)
- LGA 1356 (Socket B2)
- LGA 1156 (Socket H)
- LGA 1155 (Socket H2)
- LGA 1150 (Socket H3)
- LGA 1151 (Socket H4)
- LGA 2011 (Socket R)
- LGA 2011-3 (Socket R3)
- LGA 2066 (Socket R4)
- LGA 3647 (Socket P)