Contents

• ADC
1. Definition
2. CHARACTERIZATION

ADC & DAC 1

 Definition
• ADC : Analog to Digital Converter
• ADC : a device that converts a continuous
quantity to a discrete digital number

ADC & DAC 2

 CHARACTERIZATION
• General Block Diagram of ADC
• ADC’s classification
• Digital Output Codes
• Ideal input-output characteristics of a 3-bit ADC

ADC & DAC 3

 General Block Diagram of ADC

• Prefilter : Avoids the aliasing of high frequency signals

back into the baseband of the ADC
• Sample-and-hold : Maintains the input analog signal
constant during conversion
• Quantizer : Finds the subrange that corresponds to the
sampled analog input
• Encoder : Encoding of the digital bits corresponding to the
subrange
ADC & DAC 4
 ADC’s classification
• Frequency
1. fB ~ 0.5fS : Nyquist ADCs
2. fB << 0.5fS : Oversampled ADCs
• Conversion rate
1. Slow
2. Medium
3. Fast

ADC & DAC 5

• Linear ADCs : the range of the input values that map to
each output value has a linear relationship with the
output value
• Non-linear ADCs : If the probability density function of a
signal being digitized is uniform, then the signal-to-noise
ratio relative to the quantization noise is the best
possible. Because this is often not the case, it is usual to
pass the signal through its cumulative distribution
function before the quantization. This is good because
the regions that are more important get quantized with a
better resolution.

ADC & DAC 6

 Digital Output Codes
Decimal Binary Thermometer Gray Two’s Complement

0 000 0000000 000 000

1 001 0000001 001 111
2 010 0000011 011 110
3 011 0000111 010 101
4 100 0001111 110 100
5 101 0011111 111 011
6 110 0111111 101 010
7 111 1111111
ADC & DAC 100 001 7
Ideal input-output characteristics of a 3-bit ADC

ADC & DAC 8

• Resolution: the smallest analog change that
distinguishable by an ADC.
• Quantization : Noise is the ±0.5LSB (least significant
bit) uncertainty between the infinite resolution
characteristic and the actual characteristic.
• Offset Error : the difference between the ideal finite
resolution characteristic and actual finite resolution
characteristic

ADC & DAC 9

• Gain Error : the difference between the ideal finite
resolution characteristic and actual finite resolution
characteristic measured at full scale input. This
difference is proportional to the analog input voltage.

ADC & DAC 10