A 500 k event/sec 12-bit ADC system with high-speed buffered PCI interface

A low-cost replacement for popular LeCroy 2249-series charge-integrating ADCs with more than 100 times faster data throughput is designed and tested. The A/D converter chips used in the design provide 700 ns conversion time. Parallel 25 MHz/32-bit bus made of a twisted pair ribbon cable connected to a high-speed buffered PCI interface is capable of 100 MByte/s data transfer to an ordinary IBM PC. The front-end of each ADC channel is equipped with a unipolar Baseline Restoration Circuit allowing use of AC coupling at very high signal rates (RF preamplifiers, HV decoupled signal sources like PMTs, wire chambers, etc.). Developed for Positron Emission Tomography, the system could also be used for a range of High Energy Physics applications, Spectroscopy, Medical Imaging and others where high event rate occurs.