Delta, Delta-Sigma, and

Adaptive Delta Modulation

and Demodulation
JEREMY RUPPERT
AUBURN UNIVERSITY
First, a few definitions

An analog to digital converter (ADC) changes an analog signal into a digital

one. Some examples: voice, temperature, pressure
A quantizer takes a set of input values and maps it to a smaller set of
values, usually a predetermined range of voltages.
A limiter is a circuit that allows signals below a specified input power or
level to pass unaffected while attenuating the peaks of stronger signals
that exceed this threshold to prevent distortion.
Sampling is the reduction of a continuous time signal to a discrete signal, a
sequence of quantities.
Pulse code modulation is sampling an analog signal to derive a data
stream, a series of 1s and 0s.
Delta Modulation
An analog-to-digital and digital-to-
analog signal conversion technique
Simplest form of differential pulse-
code modulation (DPCM)
Periodically samples the input
message, to make a comparison of the
current sample with that preceding it,
and outputs a single bit which
indicates the sign of the difference
between the two samples.
 Delta Modulation

Transmitted data is reduced to a 1-bit data stream. Delta Modulated Signal

Each segment of the approximated signal is Note the saw-tooth waveform
compared to the original analog wave to determine
the increase or decrease in relative amplitude.
Delta Modulation

Demodulated Delta Signal:

Input speech message Yellow
Demodulated message Green

Visible noise difference

between original message and
demodulated message
Delta Modulation - Advantages

SNR Delta modulation gives a higher signal-to-noise ratio than other

conventional modulation techniques
Bandwidth - lower channel bandwidth consumption. Sending one binary bit
as a carrier pulse with one sample of digitized data lowers the bandwidth of
the transmission channel
Simple circuitry adder, integrator, quantizer, LPF for demodulation
Delta Modulation - Disadvantages

Slope overload - If the input

signal is rising or falling with a
slope larger than /T, where T is
the sampling time, we say that
the sampler is suffering from
slope overload.
Granular noise the output
signal must always either
increase by a step, or decrease
by a step, and cannot stay at a
single value. This means that if
the input signal is level, the
output signal could be
oscillatory.

Increased step size to alleviate slope overload

Delta Modulation

Original Message Delta Modulated

Delta-Sigma Modulation
Adaptation of step size

Places an integrator in between the source

and the summer which obviates the need
for an integrator at demodulation, so the Delta-Sigma Modulated Signal
demodulator can be a simple LPF. More closely related to the original wave
Delta-Sigma Modulation Advantages

Attempts to alleviate avoid slope overload, reducing quantization error.

Resulting analog signal then added to the input signal
Reduces error introduced by the delta-modulation.
Used in modern electronics
Converters, switched-mode power supplies, motor controllers
Also used in some high-performance data-acquisition devices
Delta-Sigma Modulation

Demodulated DeltaSigma Signal:

Input speech message Yellow

Demodulated message Green
Delta-Sigma Modulation

Original Message Delta-Sigma Modulated

Adaptive Delta Modulation

A large step size was required when sampling those

parts of the input waveform of steep slope. But a
large step size worsened the granularity of the
sampled signal when the waveform being sampled
Adaptive Delta Modulated Signal
was changing slowly.
A small step size is needed for when the slope is
changing quickly.
Adaptive Delta Modulation

Allows for a controllable step size to be implemented

Continuous Variable Slope Delta Modulation (CVSDM)
Encodes the difference between predicted samples and speech samples
Provides a more efficient comparison and reduction in the number of bits per
sample.
Commonly used in short-range wireless digital voice transmission for its
low implementation cost and robustness in dealing with bit errors
Adaptive Delta Modulation

Demodulated Adaptive Delta Signal

Input speech message Yellow

Demodulated message Green
Adaptive Delta Modulation

Original Message Adaptive Delta Modulated

Summary and Comparison of Noise

Delta modulation Delta sigma modulation Adaptive delta modulation

Sources
http://www.ni.com/white-paper/11342/en/
http://www.ti.com/lit/an/slyt423/slyt423.pdf
http://electronicdesign.com/analog/understandi
ng-delta-sigma-modulators
http://www.eng.auburn.edu/~troppel/courses/TI
MS-manuals-
r5/TIMS%20Experiment%20Manuals/Student_Te
xt/Vol-D1/D1-13.pdf
http://www.eng.auburn.edu/~roppeth/courses
/TIMS-manuals-
r5/TIMS%20Experiment%20Manuals/Student_
Text/Vol-D1/D1-16.pdf
http://www.eng.auburn.edu/~roppeth/courses
/TIMS-manuals-
r5/TIMS%20Experiment%20Manuals/Student_
Text/Vol-D1/D1-15.pdf