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:
Aug. 13, 1996
Filed:
Dec. 22, 1994
Aaron L Fisher, Allentown, PA (US);
AT&T Corp., Murray Hill, NJ (US);
Abstract
There is disclosed an integrated circuit including a sense amplifier. The sense amplifier is capable of encoding 2.sup.n levels of output characteristic into a bit pattern of n corresponding bits. The sense amplifier includes a non-zero detect circuit for detecting when the output characteristic is zero. The sense amplifier also includes 2.sup.n -2 comparators for comparing an output characteristic to 2.sup.n -2 reference levels when the output characteristic is non-zero. The 2.sup.n -2 reference levels are constructed from 2.sup.n -2 non-zero levels of the 2.sup.n possible levels of output characteristic. An encoder is coupled to the non-zero detect circuit and the comparators. The encoder encodes the output from the non-zero detect circuit and the outputs from the comparators to corresponding predetermined bit patterns. When the output characteristic is determined to be zero by the non-zero detect circuit, the bit pattern output is a default bit pattern. When the output characteristic is non-zero, the bit pattern takes on predetermined values determined by which pair of reference levels the output falls between, or whether the output characteristic is greater than the largest reference level or less than the smallest reference level.