Silane (S1H4), a pyrophoric gas, is the most widely used gas for the growth of dielectric films used in integrated circuit manufacturing. The industry has extensive experience in the handling of silane, but as process throughput continues to increase, so to do the concerns regarding safety and implementation issues involving this material. Trimethylsilane ((CH3)3SiH) is a non-pyrophoric organosilicon gas which can be used as a safe replacement for silane. Its material properties allow for standard packaging and quick integration into plasma deposition processes. The use of a non-pyrophoric gas will increase safety and process equipment uptime. By direct comparison to silane based processes, it is demonstrated that high quality films of silicon dioxide and silicon nitride can be deposited from trimethylsilane. In addition, hard, inert amorphous silicon carbide films can be deposited using the gas as a single precursor.