Microprocessor-assisted calibration for analog-to-digital converter
First Claim
1. A time-interleaved analog-to-digital converter comprising:
- two or more analog-to-digital converters for sampling, interleaved in time, an analog input signal;
first circuitry for generating measurements by processing a plurality of samples of signals in the two or more analog-to-digital converters and recording the measurements in an on-chip memory accessible by a microprocessor on-chip with the two or more analog-to-digital converters;
the microprocessor for executing instructions stored on-chip configured to carry out one or more calibration algorithms for calculating one or more correction terms based on the measurements; and
second circuitry for correcting one or more signals in the two or more analog-to-digital converters based on the correction terms.
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Accused Products
Abstract
Analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) can have errors which can affect their performance. To improve the performance, many techniques have been used to compensate or correct for the errors. When the ADCs are being implemented with sub-micron technology, ADCs can be readily and easily equipped with an on-chip microprocessor for performing a variety of digital functions. The on-chip microprocessor and any suitable digital circuitry can implement functions for reducing those errors, enabling certain undesirable artifacts to be reduced, and providing a flexible platform for a highly configurable ADC. The on-chip microprocessor is particularly useful for a randomized time-interleaved ADC. Moreover, a randomly sampling ADC can be added in parallel to a main ADC for calibration purposes. Furthermore, the overall system can include an efficient implementation for correcting errors in an ADC.
49 Citations
32 Claims
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1. A time-interleaved analog-to-digital converter comprising:
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two or more analog-to-digital converters for sampling, interleaved in time, an analog input signal; first circuitry for generating measurements by processing a plurality of samples of signals in the two or more analog-to-digital converters and recording the measurements in an on-chip memory accessible by a microprocessor on-chip with the two or more analog-to-digital converters; the microprocessor for executing instructions stored on-chip configured to carry out one or more calibration algorithms for calculating one or more correction terms based on the measurements; and second circuitry for correcting one or more signals in the two or more analog-to-digital converters based on the correction terms. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26)
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12. A method for assisting a time-interleaved analog-to-digital converter, the method comprising:
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executing, by a microprocessor on-chip with the time-interleaved analog-to-digital converter, instructions stored on-chip to calculate coefficients for calibrating the time-interleaved analog-to-digital converter; processing, by dedicated circuitry, signals in the time-interleaved analog-to-digital converter; recording, by the dedicated circuitry, measurements of the signals in a memory accessible to the on-chip microprocessor; and writing, by the on-chip microprocessor, the coefficients to calibration circuitry for adjusting one or more signals in the time-interleaved analog-to-digital converter and correcting one or more errors in the time-interleaved analog-to-digital converter, wherein the coefficients are determined by the on-chip microprocessor based on the measurements and the instructions. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 27, 28)
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18. A system on-chip with a time-interleaved analog-to-digital converter for assisting the time-interleaved analog-to-digital converter, the system comprising:
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first circuitry for generating measurements by processing a plurality of samples of signals in the two or more analog-to-digital converters and recording the measurements in an on-chip memory accessible by a microprocessor on-chip with the time-interleaved analog-to-digital converter; a microprocessor for executing instructions to carry out arithmetic logic for processing the measurements and calculating correction terms for calibrating the time-interleaved analog-to-digital converter; memory for storing instructions and data associated with the arithmetic logic; and an interrupt arbiter including second circuitry for generating an interrupt signal to the microprocessor in response to receiving one or more signals from the first circuitry indicating measurements are ready. - View Dependent Claims (19, 20, 21)
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29. A time-interleaved data converter comprising:
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two or more data converters operating in a time-interleaved fashion; circuitry for processing signals of the two or more data converter and recording measurements based on the signals in a memory accessible by the microprocessor; and a microprocessor on-chip with the two or more data converters for executing instructions stored on-chip configured to execute computations to calculate one or more coefficients based on the measurements; wherein the microprocessor is further configured to write the one or more coefficients usable to correct a signal in the time-interleaved data converter. - View Dependent Claims (30, 31, 32)
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Specification