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:
Oct. 07, 1997
Filed:
Apr. 07, 1995
Richard Knight Hester, Whitewright, TX (US);
William J Bright, Dallas, TX (US);
Iowa State University Research Foundation, Inc., Ames, IA (US);
Abstract
Methods and apparatus for an analog-to-digital converter (ADC) with reduced comparator-hysteresis effects. One embodiment uses a charge-redistribution ADC. One method performs an initial coarse analog-to-digital conversion to avoid overdriving an analog voltage comparator. One such method includes a redundant capacitor in an array of charge-redistribution capacitors used in the ADC for sample-and-hold and successive-approximation functions. Another method performs a traditional initial successive-approximation analog-to-digital conversion, and then performs an additional conversion-step test based on the least-significant bit of the initial result to correct for comparator errors in the initial conversion.