Reference scaling, op amp balancing and chopper stabilization techniques for delta-sigma modulators of analog-to-digital converters are provided. For reference scaling, unit elements in a feedback digital-to-analog (DAC) converter are driven by a reference voltage or disconnected from active circuitry to realize three DAC levels. While disconnected, the unit elements deliver no charge to the device which results in power saving and a reduction in thermal noise. Op amp balancing involves down-sampling the quantizer output followed by up-sampling on the feedback path and filtering to hold a DAC value of the signal for a duration of a sampling period to generate the feedback signal. Chopper stabilization is performed by chopping an operational transconductance amplifier of the integrator at a chopping frequency equal to the sampling frequency.

A method for calibrating a multi-bit Delta-Sigma modulator is disclosed herein. The method includes at least one main multi-bit digital-analogue converter in a return loop for generating a return signal subtracted from an input of the modulator. The main converter includes a plurality of elementary source cells at least some of which, referred to as active cells, are associated with the various input bits of the converter for generating the return signal. The output level of these active source cells is adjustable under the action of a matching signal that comes from a calibration circuit receiving an output signal from the modulator at its input. The calibration circuit includes a generator of a calibration sequence.

A sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter includes: a subtractor for subtracting a feedback signal from an analog input signal; a loop filter for processing the output signal from the subtractor to generate a filtered signal; a signal comparing circuit for selectively operating in an offset detection mode or a signal comparison mode, wherein the signal comparing circuit generates an error signal irrelevant to the relative magnitude between the filtered signal and a reference signal in the offset detection mode, and generates a comparison signal corresponding to the relative magnitude between the filtered signal and the reference signal in the signal comparison mode; an offset calibration control circuit for calibrating the offset of the signal comparing circuit and for controlling the signal comparing circuit to alternately switch between the offset detection mode and the signal comparison mode; and a digital-to-analog converter for generating the feedback signal according to the comparison signal.

Method for calibrating a multi-bit Delta-Sigma modulator comprising at least one main multi-bit digital-analogue converter in the return loop for generating a return signal subtracted from the input of the modulator, the main converter comprising a plurality of elementary source cells at least some of which, referred to as active cells, are associated with the various input bits of the converter for generating the return signal, the output level of these active source cells being adjustable under the action of a matching signal, the matching signal coming from a calibration circuit receiving an output signal from the modulator at its input, this calibration circuit comprising a generator of a calibration sequence.

A modulator including a delta-sigma modulation circuit having an order greater than 1, and configured to modulate an input signal into a Pulse Density Modulated (PDM) signal; and a Pad Asymmetric Compensation (PAC) circuit configured to linearize a relation between a magnitude of the input signal and a number of rise or fall transitions of the PDM signal by maximizing the number of rise or fall transitions of the PDM signal, and to output a modified PDM signal, wherein the linearized relation is for compensating for any offset in the PDM signal.

A modulator including a delta-sigma modulation circuit having an order greater than 1, and configured to modulate an input signal into a Pulse Density Modulated (PDM) signal; and a Pad Asymmetric Compensation (PAC) circuit configured to linearize a relation between a magnitude of the input signal and a number of rise or fall transitions of the PDM signal by maximizing the number of rise or fall transitions of the PDM signal, and to output a modified PDM signal, wherein the linearized relation is for compensating for any offset in the PDM signal.

Sampling accuracy during sampling of analog input signals may be improved by performing an auto-zero every sample procedure. The ratio of input signal samples to zero input samples for the sampling time interval defined by the sampling frequency may be determined based on the sampling frequency. For sampling frequencies equal to or less than a specified frequency characteristic of the signal conditioning path of the analog input signal, the ratio may be set to unity (one). For sampling frequencies above the specified frequency, the ratio may be set to be greater than unity (one), and may be a power-of-two. A digital signal processing block may include independent digital signal processing paths for the input signal measurements and the zero input measurements. Each signal processing path may include a low-pass infinite impulse response filter, an average decimation finite impulse response filter, and a binary shifter to allow for the adjustable ratio.

A device having a sample-rate converter that may be programmed to generate samples at different rates is synchronized to an external synchronization pulse by temporarily changing the sample rate to a temporary sample rate and then changing the sample rate back to the original sample rate. Synchronization in a reduced amount of time is achieved by determining the interval between the synchronization pulse and one of the output samples and determining a processing time of the device for generating the output samples at a new rate. The system calculates a temporary sample rate based on these calculations that tends to reduce an amount of time to achieve synchronization.

A delta-sigma modulator includes a quantizer, a signal propagation path including a plurality of cascaded integrators coupled between the input node and the quantizer, and a feedback network including a plurality of digital-to-analog converters. In a calibration mode of operation, a first digital-to-analog converter of the plurality of digital-to-analog converters of the feedback network receives a signal including a periodic alternated digital sequence, the first digital-to-analog converter being coupled to a first integrator of the plurality of cascaded integrators, integrators of the plurality of cascaded integrators other than the first integrator operate in a gain mode of operation, the delta-sigma modulator generates a digital test signal at an output of the quantizer based on the signal including the periodic alternated digital sequence, and calibration circuitry generates a calibration signal based on the digital test signal and a reference digital word.

A flash analog-to-digital converter (ADC) includes comparators that convert an analog input signal to a digital output signal. Offsets of these comparators introduce noise and can hurt the performance of the ADC. Thus, these comparators are calibrated using calibration codes. Conventional calibration methods determine these calibration codes by removing the ADC from an input signal. Otherwise, it is difficult to distinguish the noise from the signal in the calibration measurement. In contrast, an embodiment can determine the calibration codes while the ADC converts the input signal to a digital signal. Such an embodiment can be achieved by a frequency-domain technique. In an embodiment employing a frequency-domain power meter, an input signal can be removed from the power measurement. This removal enables accurate measurement of in-band noise without having the measurement be corrupted by input signal power.