Unit-4 (A/D & D/A Convertor)

Digital to analog converters: weighted resistor/converter,

R-2R Ladder D/A converter,
specifications for D/A converters,
examples of D/A converter lCs
 Analog & Digital Signals
Analog Data
• Analog data refers to information which is continuous.
• For Example, an Analog clock which is having hour, minute, and
second hands that gives information in a continuous form; the
movement of the hands are continuous.
Digital Data
• Digital data refers to information which has discrete states.
• For Example, a digital clock which reports the hours and minutes
that will change suddenly from 10:05 to 10:06.
Analog Signal
• Analog signals have infinitely so many levels of intensity over a
period of time.
• When the wave moves from value A to value B, it passes through
and it includes an infinite number of values along its path.
 Digital Signal
• Digital signals can have only a limited number
of defined values.
• Although each value can be any number, it is
often as simple as 0 or 1.
• The easiest way to show signals is by plotting
them on a pair of perpendicular axes.
• The vertical axis represents the value or
strength of a signal.
• The horizontal axis represents time.
Waveform
 Explanation
• The above figure shows the Analog signal and
a digital signal.
• The curve represents the Analog signal
through an infinite number of points.
• The vertical lines of the digital signal, however,
demonstrate the sudden jump that the signal
makes from value to value.
 Digital to analog converters
• A Digital to Analog Converter (DAC) converts a
digital input signal into an analog output signal. The
digital signal is represented with a binary code,
which is a combination of bits 0 and 1.
• The block diagram of DAC is shown in the following
figure
 Where do we need DACs?
• A computer is a binary machine operating in an analog
world, so to be able to produce an output that is
understandable by other devices a DAC is used.
• For example, a computer stores audio in the form of
binary values of the sound wave.
• In order to play these back as sound on a speaker we
need analog signals, because as we know the speaker’s
diaphragm vibrates based on the intensity of the
analog signal to produce sound/music.
• So here, we will a DAC to convert the digital audio file
to analog signal in order to play it on a speaker.
Block Diagram

Digital to
Analog
Digital to Analog
Converter
Converter

Digital to Analog Converter

 Working of DAC
• The digital binary data exists in the form of
bits. Each bit is either 1 or 0 & they represent
its weight corresponding to its position.
• The weight is 2n where the n is the position of
the bit from right hand side & it start from 0.
• Bit Weight = 2n
• Bit weight of 4th bit from left= 2n = 23 = 8
• The bit weight is multiplied by the bit value.
Since the bit could be either 0 or 1, it means;
 Working of DAC-2
• Bit value of 1 x bit weight = 1 x 2n = 2n
• Bit value of 0 x bit weight = 0 x 2(n-1) = 0
• Now adding the weights of all the bits with its
value in a binary number 10011;
• 1 00112 = (1 x 24) + (0 x 23) + (0 x 22) + (1 x 21) + (1
x 20 )
• 100112 = 16 + 0 + 0 + 2 + 1 & 100112 = 19
• This is how the digital to analog converter DAC
works by adding the weights of all corresponding
bits with its value to generate the analog value at
its output.
 Types of DACs
• There are two types of DACs
• Weighted Resistor DAC
• R-2R Ladder DAC
Weighted Resistor DAC
• A weighted resistor DAC produces an analog
output, which is almost equal to the digital
(binary) input by using binary weighted
resistors in the inverting adder circuit.
• In short, a binary weighted resistor DAC is called
as weighted resistor DAC.
 Circuit diagram of a 3-bit binary
weighted resistor DAC
• The circuit diagram of a 3-bit binary weighted
resistor DAC is shown in the following figure.
 Explanation
• Recall that the bits of a binary number can have only
one of the two values. i.e., either 0 or 1.
• Let the 3-bit binary input is b2b1b0.
• Here, the bits b2 and b0 denote the Most Significant
Bit (MSB) and Least Significant Bit (LSB) respectively.
• The digital switches shown in the above figure will be
connected to ground, when the corresponding input
bits are equal to ‘0’.
• Similarly, the digital switches shown in the above figure
will be connected to the negative reference
voltage, −VR when the corresponding input bits are
equal to ‘1’.
 Explanation-2
• In the above circuit, the non-inverting input
terminal of an op-amp is connected to ground.
• That means zero volts is applied at the non-
inverting input terminal of op-amp.
• According to the virtual short concept, the
voltage at the inverting input terminal of op-amp
is same as that of the voltage present at its non-
inverting input terminal.
• So, the voltage at the inverting input terminal’s
node will be zero volts.
• The nodal equation at the inverting input
terminal’s node is:
Nodal Equation
 Explanation
• The above equation represents the output
voltage equation of a 3-bit binary weighted
resistor DAC.
• Since the number of bits are three in the binary
(digital) input, we will get seven possible values
of output voltage by varying the binary input
from 000 to 111 for a fixed reference voltage, VR.
• We can write the generalized output voltage
equation of an N-bit binary weighted resistor
DAC as shown below based on the output voltage
equation of a 3-bit binary weighted resistor DAC.
 Example-1
• 4-bit Binary Weighted Digital-to-Analogue
Converter
 Solution: Nodal Equation
• 4-bit DAC
 Example
4-bit Weighted D/A Converter Output
 Disadvantages
• The disadvantages of a binary weighted
resistor DAC are as follows −
• The difference between the resistance values
corresponding to LSB & MSB will increase as
the number of bits present in the digital input
increases.
• It is difficult to design more accurate resistors
as the number of bits present in the digital
input increases.
 R-2R Ladder DAC
• The R-2R Ladder DAC overcomes the
disadvantages of a binary weighted resistor
DAC.
• As the name suggests, R-2R Ladder DAC
produces an analog output.
• which is almost equal to the digital (binary)
input by using a R-2R ladder network in the
inverting adder circuit.
 Circuit Diagram
• The circuit diagram of a 3-bit R-2R Ladder DAC
is shown in the following figure.
 Explanation
• Recall that the bits of a binary number can have only one of the two
values. i.e., either 0 or 1.
• Let the 3-bit binary input is b2b1b0.
• Here, the bits b2 and b0 denote the Most Significant Bit (MSB) and
Least Significant Bit (LSB) respectively.
• The digital switches shown in the above figure will be connected to
ground, when the corresponding input bits are equal to ‘0’.
• Similarly, the digital switches shown in above figure will be
connected to the negative reference voltage, −VR when the
corresponding input bits are equal to ‘1’.
• It is difficult to get the generalized output voltage equation of a R-
2R Ladder DAC.
• But, we can find the analog output voltage values of R-2R Ladder
DAC for individual binary input combinations easily.
 Example
Q1. A 4-bit R-2R digital-to-analogue converter is
constructed to control the speed of a small DC motor
using the output from a digital logic circuit. If the logic
circuit uses 10 volt CMOS devices, calculate the analogue
output voltage from the DAC when the input code is
hexadecimal number.
 Solution

the output voltage for a binary code of 1011 is calculated as:

Table
 Advantages
• The advantages of a R-2R Ladder DAC are as
follows −
• R-2R Ladder DAC contains only two values of
resistor: R and 2R. So, it is easy to select and
design more accurate resistors.
• If more number of bits are present in the digital
input, then we have to include required number
of R-2R sections additionally.
• Due to the above advantages, R-2R Ladder DAC is
preferable over binary weighted resistor DAC
 Applications of DAC
• Digital to analog converters are used in various applications
to convert a digitally processed signal into an analog signal.
• Some of the various applications of a DAC are given below;
Audio:
• The audio signal is analog in nature but it is converted using
ADC (analog to digital converter) into digital format to edit
& store in storage devices in various digital formats such as
mp3, wav etc.
• The audio amplifier or the sound card in a system contains
DAC that converts the audio signal stored in digital device
into an analog signal.
• The signal can be modified by the amplifier by varying its
gain (volume), bass, treble etc. & then converted into
analog signal because the speaker cannot support a digital
signal.
 Applications of DAC
Video:
• Digital video players utilize DAC to play any digital
video using an analog monitor.
• These video players convert the digital signal
from the digital source file into an analog signal.
• A digital video player has digital video ports such
as DVI or HDMI.
• But if it has any analog output ports (composite
port of yellow color), it contains a DAC whose job
is to convert the video file into analog signal.
 Applications of DAC
Motor Control
• One of the most important components in
controlling a motor using a digital device such as
a microcontroller is a DAC.
• In various electronics projects, motor is
embedded with a microcontroller.
• The microcontroller generates a digital signal to
vary the speed of the motor which is converted
into an analog signal using a DAC (Digital to
Analog Converter)
 Unit-4 (A/D Convertor)
analog to digital converters: quantization and encoding,
Flash A/D converter,
successive approximation A/D converter,
counting A/D converter,
dual slope A/D converter,
Specifications of A/D converters,
example of A/D converter ICs
 Analog to Digital Converter (ADC)
• An Analog to Digital Converter (ADC) converts
an analog signal into a digital signal.
• The digital signal is represented with a binary
code, which is a combination of bits 0 and 1.
• Observe that in the figure shown above, an
Analog to Digital Converter (ADC) consists of a
single analog input and many binary outputs.
• In general, the number of binary outputs of
ADC will be a power of two.
Block Diagram
Waveform
 What is A/D converter?
• From the name itself it is clear that it is a converter which converts
the analog (continuously variable) signal to digital signal.
• This is really an electronic integrated circuit which directly converts
the continuous form of signal to discrete form.
• It can be expressed as A/D or A-to-D or A-D or ADC.
• The input (analog) to this system can have any value in a range and
are directly measured.
• But for output (digital) of an N-bit A/D converter, it should have
only 2N discrete values.
• This A/D converter is a linkage between the analog (linear) world of
transducers and discreet world of processing the signal and
handling the data.
• The digital to analog converter (DAC) carry out the inverse function
of the ADC. The schematic representation of ADC is shown below.
 ADC Process
• There are mainly two steps involves in the process of
conversion. They are
• Sampling and Holding
• Quantizing and Encoding
 Sampling and Holding
Sampling and Holding
• In the process of Sample and hold (S/H), the
continuous signal will gets sampled and freeze
(hold) the value at a steady level for a particular
least period of time.
• It is done to remove variations in input signal
which can alter the conversion process and
thereby increases the accuracy.
• The minimum sampling rate has to be two times
the maximum data frequency of the input signal.
 Quantizing and Encoding
Quantizing and Encoding
• For understanding quantizing, we can first go
through the term Resolution used in ADC.
• It is the smallest variation in analog signal that
will result in a variation in the digital output.
• This actually represents the quantization error.

V → Reference voltage range

2N → Number of states
N → Number of bits in digital output
 Explanation-1
• Quantizing: It is the process in
which the reference signal is
partitioned into several discrete
quanta and then the input signal
is matched with the correct
quantum.
• Encoding: Here; for each
quantum, a unique digital code
will be assigned and after that
the input signal is allocated with
this digital code.
• The process of quantizing and
encoding is demonstrated in the
table below.
 Explanation-2
• From the above table we can
observe that only one digital
value is used to represent the
whole range of voltage in an
interval.
• Thus, an error will occur and it is
called quantization error.
• This is the noise introduced by
the process of quantization.
• Here the maximum quantization
error is:
 Application of ADC
• Used together with the transducer.
• Used in computer to convert the analog signal to
digital signal.
• Used in cell phones.
• Used in microcontrollers.
• Used in digital signal processing.
• Used in digital storage oscilloscopes.
• Used in scientific instruments.
• Used in music reproduction technology etc.
 Types of ADCs
• There are two types of ADCs: Direct type ADCs and
Indirect type ADC.
• If the ADC performs the analog to digital conversion
directly by utilizing the internally generated equivalent
digital (binary) code for comparing with the analog
input, then it is called as Direct type ADC.
The following are the examples of Direct type ADCs −
• Counter type ADC
• Successive Approximation ADC
• Flash type ADC
 Counter type ADC
• A counter type
ADC produces a
digital output,
which is
approximately
equal to the
analog input by
using counter
operation
internally.
• The block
diagram of a
counter type
ADC is shown in
the following
figure.
 Working of a counter type ADC
• The counter type ADC mainly consists of 5 blocks: Clock
signal generator, Counter, DAC, Comparator and
Control logic.
The working of a counter type ADC is as follows:
• The control logic resets the counter and enables the
clock signal generator in order to send the clock pulses
to the counter, when it received the start commanding
signal.
• The counter gets incremented by one for every clock
pulse and its value will be in binary (digital) format.
• This output of the counter is applied as an input of
DAC.
• DAC converts the received binary (digital) input, which
is the output of counter, into an analog output.
 Working of a counter type ADC-2
• Comparator compares this analog value, Va with the external
analog input value Vi.
• The output of comparator will be ‘1’ as long as 𝑉𝑖 is greater than.
• The operations mentioned in above two steps will be continued as
long as the control logic receives ‘1’ from the output of comparator.
• The output of comparator will be ‘0’ when Vi is less than or equal
to Va.
• So, the control logic receives ‘0’ from the output of comparator.
Then, the control logic disables the clock signal generator so that it
doesn’t send any clock pulse to the counter.
• At this instant, the output of the counter will be displayed as
the digital output.
• It is almost equivalent to the corresponding external analog input
value Vi.
 Successive Approximation ADC
• A successive
approximation
type
ADC produces a
digital output,
which is
approximately
equal to the
analog input by
using successive
approximation
technique
internally.
Working of a successive approximation
ADC
• The successive approximation ADC mainly consists of 5
blocks− Clock signal generator, Successive
Approximation Register (SAR), DAC, comparator and
Control logic.
The working of a successive approximation ADC is as
follows −
• The control logic resets all the bits of SAR and enables
the clock signal generator in order to send the clock
pulses to SAR, when it received the start commanding
signal.
• The binary (digital) data present in SAR will be updated
for every clock pulse based on the output of
comparator.
• The output of SAR is applied as an input of DAC.
Working of a successive approximation
ADC-2
• DAC converts the received digital input, which is the output
of SAR, into an analog output.
• The comparator compares this analog value Va with the
external analog input value Vi.
• The output of a comparator will be ‘1’ as long as Vi is
greater than Va.
• Similarly, the output of comparator will be ‘0’, when Vi is
less than or equal to Va.
• The operations mentioned in above steps will be continued
until the digital output is a valid one.
• The digital output will be a valid one, when it is almost
equivalent to the corresponding external analog input
value Vi.
Flash type ADC
• A flash type
ADC produces an
equivalent digital
output for a
corresponding analog
input in no time.
• Hence, flash type ADC
is the fastest ADC.
Diagram
Diagram
 Working of a 3-bit flash type ADC
• The 3-bit flash type ADC consists of a voltage divider network, 7
comparators and a priority encoder.
The working of a 3-bit flash type ADC is as follows.
• The voltage divider network contains 8 equal resistors. A reference
voltage VR is applied across that entire network with respect to the
ground.
• The voltage drop across each resistor from bottom to top with respect to
ground will be the integer multiples (from 1 to 8) of VR/8.
• The external input voltage Vi is applied to the non-inverting terminal of all
comparators.
• The voltage drop across each resistor from bottom to top with respect to
ground is applied to the inverting terminal of comparators from bottom to
top.
• At a time, all the comparators compare the external input voltage with the
voltage drops present at the respective other input terminal.
• That means, the comparison operations take place by each
comparator parallelly.
 Working of a 3-bit flash type ADC-2
• The output of the comparator will be ‘1’ as long as Vi is greater
than the voltage drop present at the respective other input
terminal.
• Similarly, the output of comparator will be ‘0’, when, Vi is less than
or equal to the voltage drop present at the respective other input
terminal.
• All the outputs of comparators are connected as the inputs
of priority encoder.
• This priority encoder produces a binary code (digital output), which
is corresponding to the high priority input that has ‘1’.
• Therefore, the output of priority encoder is nothing but the binary
equivalent (digital output) of external analog input voltage, Vi.
• The flash type ADC is used in the applications where the conversion
speed of analog input into digital data should be very high
3-bit A/D converter Output
 Indirect type ADC
• If an ADC performs the analog to digital conversion by
an indirect method, then it is called an Indirect type
ADC.
• In general, first it converts the analog input into a
linear function of time (or frequency) and then it will
produce the digital (binary) output.
• Dual slope ADC is the best example of an Indirect type
ADC. This chapter discusses about it in detail.
Dual Slope ADC
• As the name suggests, a dual slope ADC produces an
equivalent digital output for a corresponding analog
input by using two (dual) slope technique.
The block diagram of a dual slope ADC
 Working of a dual slope ADC
• The dual slope ADC mainly consists of 5 blocks: Integrator,
Comparator, Clock signal generator, Control logic and
Counter.
The working of a dual slope ADC is as follows −
• The control logic resets the counter and enables the clock
signal generator in order to send the clock pulses to the
counter, when it is received the start commanding signal.
• Control logic pushes the switch sw to connect to
the external analog input voltage Vi, when it is received
the start commanding signal.
• This input voltage is applied to an integrator.
• The output of the integrator is connected to one of the two
inputs of the comparator and the other input of
comparator is connected to ground.
 Working of a dual slope ADC-2
• Comparator compares the output of the integrator with
zero volts (ground) and produces an output, which is
applied to the control logic.
• The counter gets incremented by one for every clock pulse
and its value will be in binary (digital) format.
• It produces an overflow signal to the control logic, when it
is incremented after reaching the maximum count value.
• At this instant, all the bits of counter will be having zeros
only.
• Now, the control logic pushes the switch sw to connect to
the negative reference voltage −Vref.
• This negative reference voltage is applied to an integrator.
• It removes the charge stored in the capacitor until it
becomes zero.
 Working of a dual slope ADC-3
• At this instant, both the inputs of a comparator are having
zero volts.
• So, comparator sends a signal to the control logic.
• Now, the control logic disables the clock signal generator
and retains (holds) the counter value.
• The counter value is proportional to the external analog
input voltage.
• At this instant, the output of the counter will be displayed
as the digital output.
• It is almost equivalent to the corresponding external analog
input value ViVi.
• The dual slope ADC is used in the applications,
where accuracy is more important while converting analog
input into its equivalent digital (binary) data
Thanks