The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jun. 11, 1991
Filed:
Mar. 31, 1988
Andrew G Dingwall, Princeton Township, Mercer County, NJ (US);
Harris Semiconductor Patents, Inc., Melbourne, FL (US);
Abstract
There is disclosed a decoder configuration for a high-speed flash-type analog-to-digital converter which utilizes a plurality of comparators arranged from a first lower order comparator to a last high order comparator based on the particular position of each comparator as coupled to taps of a reference resistance ladder. The measurement point in such a system can be logically decoded by establishing the tap where all comparators below it are low and ideally all comparators above the tap are high. This is implemented in a decoding scheme which implements the test by testing all combinations of three adjacent comparators so that the selected tap is high and the taps immediately above and below it are high and low respectively to therefore detect an HHL sequence. In regard to the present invention, there are included means which will prevent a higher order HHL sequence from appearing when a lower order HHL sequence is detected. In this manner by inhibiting a higher state reading with a lower state reading, one can prevent serious errors which would undesirably cause a 'sparkle' in the decoded output signal.