High speed A/D conversion

High-speed A/D converter designs show tradeoffs between conversion speed, system approach and available or projected technology: CMOS versus bipolar versus GaAs . . . Applications of converters in large signal processing systems require a further circuit evaluation to optimize die size, power dissipation, circuit performance and testability. This is especially true for Converters with resolutions above 6b . . . A better comparison of high speed converters may be possible if additional standardized test procedures at frequencies close to half of the sampling frequency are introduced . . . Some test procedures to be addressed are linearity and resolution measurement, signal-to-noise measurement, differential gain and phase measurement and a beat frequency test procedure. Applications of converters with resolution from 6 to 10b and sampling rates from 10 to 500MHz include digital processing systems, transient recording, digital oscilloscopes and video signal processing, such as color decoding, noise reduction systems and ghost cancellation procedures.