Performance of the front-end signal processing electronics for the drift chambers of the Stanford Large Detector

The authors report on the performance of the front-end analog and digital signal processing electronics for the drift chambers of the Stanford Large Detector (SLD) at the Standard Linear Collider. The electronics mounted on printed circuit boards include up to 64 channels of transimpedance amplification, analog sampling, analog-to-digital conversion, and associated control circuitry. Measurements of the time resolution, gain, noise, linearity, crosstalk, and stability of the readout electronics are described and presented. Performance tests of the front-end signal processing electronics for the drift chambers indicate that the primary design goals of good timing resolution and good charge division resolution have been achieved. For large signals, the timing resolution is 2.6 ns and is dominated by the inherent resolution of the sampling frequency. The good signal-to-noise ratio and the fast risetime of the amplifier should prevent any loss of timing resolution due to the electronics