Method and apparatus for automatically calibrating the gain and offset

Abstract

A circuit for automatically matching the gain and offset of a time-shifted digitizing channel in a data acquisition circuit which includes a reference digitizing channel, having a fixed voltage reference, and at least one time-shifted digitizing channel having components that are adjustable for gain and offset. Feedback is provided by examining the dynamic range and average value of a known input signal which is digitized, sent through the time-shifted digitizing channel and stored in memory. A microprocessor reads the stored data and, by separately varying the gain and offset parameters, computes optimal values for each parameter. Digital-to-analog converters (DAC's) allow the microprocessor to communicate with one fixed-gain variable-offset amplifier in the front end and with one fixed-gain variable-offset amplifier and one analog-to-digital converter (ADC) in each time-shifted digitizing channel. By controlling the offset of the amplifiers and the reference level of the ADC, precise matching of the gain and offset of the time-shifted digitizing channel with the gain and offset of the reference digitizing channel may be performed easily and inexpensively. The circuit may be extended to an arbitrary number of additional time-shifted digitizing channels and provides a comparatively simple, inexpensive way to automatically match the gain and offset of each time-shifted digitizing channel.