New sequence switching and layout technique for high-speed high-accuracy current-steering DACs

In this paper, new sequence switching and layout techniques are presented for the design of high-speed high-accuracy current-steering DACs. Our new sequence switching technique - after-fabrication programmable switching - rearranges the switching sequence of current sources after chip fabrication, which will guarantee to generate an optimal switching sequence to achieve high static accuracy. With this implementation, the area will be reduced dramatically, which will result the reduced parasitic effect and improved dynamic performance. Moreover, the gradient effect will become much less significant. To reduce the gradient errors even more, a new layout technique is introduced.