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. 29, 2006
Filed:
Jul. 21, 2004
Applicant:
Kristiaan B. Lokere, Westford, MA (US);
Inventor:
Kristiaan B. Lokere, Westford, MA (US);
Assignee:
Linear Technology Corporation, Milpitas, CA (US);
Primary Examiner:
Int. Cl.
CPC ...
H03F 3/00 (2006.01);
U.S. Cl.
CPC ...
Abstract
The present invention comprises methods and circuits for increasing the number of selectable gain settings of an amplifier by subtracting gains. In one embodiment, the amplifier is configured with three gain channels that are power-of-three weighted—that is, the gain channels provide gains of 1×, 3× and 9×. By combining the gain values of those gain channels in a manner that adds and/or subtracts the gain values, the amplifier can be configured with any of 13 consecutive gain settings of the same polarity.