APPARATUS FOR INSPECTING WAFER SURFACE, METHOD FOR INSPECTING WAFER SURFACE, APPARATUS FOR JUDGING DEFECTIVE WAFER, METHOD FOR JUDGING DEFECTIVE WAFER, AND APPARATUS FOR PROCESSING INFORMATION ON WAFER SURFACE

摘要

This invention provides an apparatus for inspecting wafer surface using a device (21) to detect a cluster of light point defects (LPD) unevenly distributed over the surface of a silicon wafer from two-dimensional distribution information (30) on LPD as scratches or particles to judge whether the wafer is defective or not. This device enables detection of scratches or particles on the basis of an LPD map created by a particle counter (11) and an improvement in inspection efficiency and defect judgment precision. The information on a wafer surface such as scratches information and contamination information detected by a laser scatter inspector (11) is stored particularly as image information or numerical information. Both the stored sets of information are combined to simply grasp the occurrence tendency of scratches or particles in a predetermined process. A wafer supplier and user share this information, and they plan improvement in the process, respectively.