Fast accurate and complete ADC testing

It is noted that the development of monolithic ADCs (analog-to-digital converters) dictates 'all codes' testing to guarantee specifications. An on-the-fly method of analyzing ADC outputs using specialized hardware is described. This method provides immediate availability of full INL and DNL (integral and differential nonlinearity) characteristics. The noise sensitivity of the standard method is compared with that of the new method (the tally-weight-servo processor). It is concluded that the proposed tally-weight-servo processor adds significantly to the ability of a system to verify the accuracy performance of ADCs.<
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