Beneath the Digital Abstraction

Dr Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Content
The digital abstraction Beneath the digital abstraction Supply voltage Logic levels Noise margins DC transfer characteristics CMOS logic CMOS transistors CMOS gates Power consumption

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

The world is analogue

Most phenomena in the world around us are of analogue nature: temperature, pressure, speed, etc. We know that computers are digital systems. Hence, physical (analogue) variables have to be converted into digital to be processed by computers. Computer outputs (digital) have to be converted into analogue to interact with the world.
Analogue to Digital Conversion (ADC)

Analogue world

Digital to Analogue Conversion (DAC)

But what are digital signals?

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Digital signals
Digital signals are discrete both in time and in amplitude.
Amplitude
1111 1110 1101 1100 1011 1010 1001 values 1000 0111 0110 0101 0100 0011 0010 0001 0000

2n

t
1. 2. 3. 4. We have an analogue, continuous signal We make time discrete (samples) We make the amplitude discrete. Digital signals are samples of the corresponding continuous one.

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

The digital abstraction

When working with digital signals, we assume bits can only be 0 or 1. This assumption simplifies the design process a lot. We dont have to worry about intermediate values of the signals.

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Beneath the digital abstraction

Before we jump into the design of sophisticated digital systems, lets reflect a little bit about the analogue limits of digital signals. If we say a digital bit represents voltage in a wire, 0 or 5 V for example, What happens to intermediate values that are likely to appear in a real application, for example, 0.7 or 4.95 V? By convention 0 represents 0 Volts or ground (GND), while 1 represents the voltage of the power supply (VDD). Early digital circuits had a VDD= 5 V; but as technology has progressed to smaller transistors, VDD has dropped successively to 3.3 V, 2.5 V, 1.8 V, 1.5 V, 1.2 V or even lower to save power.

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Logic levels
The mapping of a continuous variable onto a discrete binary variable is done by defining logic levels.

Why do we need to define these logic levels?

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Noise
Noise is anything that degrades the signal E.g., resistance, power supply noise, coupling to neighboring wires, etc. Example: a gate (driver) could output a 5 volt signal but, because of resistance in a long wire, the signal could arrive at the receiver with a degraded value, for example, 4.5 volts

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Noise Margins

Noise margin is the amount of noise that could be added to a worstcase output such that the signal can still be interpreted as valid input. NML = VIL- VOL NMH = VOH - VIH
Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

DC transfer characteristics
To understand the limits of the digital abstraction, we must delve into the analogue behaviour of a gate. The DC transfer characteristics of a gate describe the output voltages as a function of the input voltage.

NMH = NML = VDD/2

NMH , NML < VDD/2

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

DC transfer characteristic and noise margins

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Logic levels of 5 V and 3.3 V logic families

NML = VIL- VOL NMH = VOH - VIH

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Transistors
Logic gates are usually built out of transistors Transistor is a three-ported, voltage-controlled switch Two of the ports are connected depending on the voltage on the third port For example, in the switch below the two terminals (d and s) are connected (ON) only when the third terminal (g) is 1

g=0 d g s

g=1 d

d OFF s

ON s

The two main types of transistors are bipolar transistors (BJT) and metal-oxide-semiconductor field effect transistors (MOSFETS).
Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Metal Oxide Silicon (MOS) transistors

source

Polysilicon (used to be metal) gate Oxide (silicon dioxide) insulator Doped silicon
drain

gate

source
Polysilicon SiO2

gate

drain

Polysilicon SiO2

n p gate source drain

n substrate

p n gate source
pMOS

p substrate

drain

nMOS

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Operation of nMOS transistor

Gate = 0, so it is OFF (no connection between source and drain)

Gate = 1, so it is ON (channel between source and drain)

source gate

drain

source

gate VDD

drain

GND +++++++ n p GND n substrate n ------channel p GND

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

n substrate

MOS transistors as switches

g=0 d nMOS g s s pMOS g d d s s ON d OFF

g=1 d ON s s OFF d

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Constructing gates with MOS transistors

nMOS transistors pass good 0s, so connect source to GND pMOS transistors pass good 1s, so connect source to VDD

pMOS pull-up network

inputs output
nMOS pull-down network

This arrangement is called Complementary MOS or CMOS. CMOS processes are used to build the vast majority of all transistors fabricated today.

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

CMOS NOT gate

NOT
A Y=A A 0 1 Y 1 0 Y

VDD A P1 Y N1 GND

A 0 1

P1 ON OFF

N1 OFF ON

Y 1 0
Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

CMOS NAND gate

NAND
A B Y = AB A 0 0 1 1 B 0 1 0 1 Y 1 1 1 0 Y

P2 A B

P1 Y N1 N2

A B 0 0 0 1 1 0 1 1

P1 ON ON OFF OFF

P2 ON OFF ON OFF

N1 OFF OFF ON ON

N2 OFF ON OFF ON

Y 1 1 1 0

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Other gates
What is the logic function implemented by this 3-input gate?

A B C

A B C Y

0 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 1 0 1 1 1

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Other CMOS gates

How do you build a 2-input AND gate?

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez

Suggested activities

Think about the analogue nature of digital gates. Why is it important to know about it? Make a list of all the new concepts covered in this lecture and try to create your own definition for each one of them. Research the noise margins of modern, low-voltage logic families. Play the game Engineer of the People, available in: http://jayisgames.com/archives/2009/03/engineer_of_the_people.php

Advanced Digital Design 320 Dr. Cesar Ortega-Sanchez