Tools for Precision Wideband Mixed Signal System Design
Note
This is a work in progress.
Introduction
The goal of this tutorial is to equip the reader with a collection of hardware and software tools for developing precision wideband mixed-signal applications. Content Guide: This tutorial includes complete written instructions, a video guide, and a slide deck that can be used for delivering as a hands-on workshop. What exactly does “Precision Wideband” mean?
The “precision” part means that DC parameters such as offset, gain error, linearity, and temperature drift are also important.
The “wideband” part means that unlike “low speed” applications, timing, or jitter, of individual samples with respect to previous and future samples IS critical. The application involves extracting information from arrays of samples that are correlated with each other in some way. AC performance metrics such as signal to noise ratio and total harmonic distortion extracted from a Fourier transform of the data will be considered. Even if the end application does not involve sine waves, these metrics are almost always a useful indicator of performance.
An important point is that sample jitter is important for the “wideband” aspects of these applications. If you are measuring signal to noise ratio, the Signal to Noise ratio (SNR) can be no greater than:
\(SNR <= -20 * log(2*pi*f\_{IN}*t\_{j})\)
Where: \(f_{IN}\) is the analog input frequency in Hz \(t_{j}\) is the RMS jitter in seconds RMS
In this tutorial, we will be generating excitation waveforms, digitizing time-domain signals, performing Fast Fourier Transforms (FFTs), extracting features from the frequency domain, and calculating measurement parameters. We will be measuring AC Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR), Total Harmonic Distortion (THD), measuring steps, wiggles, and other situations where precise timing is required. Throughout the exercises we’ll be writing simple Python code to capture and analyze data, using the industry standard Industrial I/O (IIO) framework to interact with the ADC, and the popular NumPy and Matplotlib Python libraries. Thus this exercise also serves as a mini-tutorial on Python.
Materials
Raspberry Pi 4; 2G, 4G, or 8G version, OR Raspberry Pi 400 (the keyboard one).
5V USB-C wall adapter for Raspberry Pi
Colorimeter Setup. This is not in production (yet), but full gerbers are provided. The pull request is in review, HERE
Optical absorbance demonstration material such as:
Optical filters such as Roscolux Selector Pack
16GB (or larger) Class 10 (or faster) micro-SD card, with Kuiper Linux installed.
User interface setup (choose one):
HDMI monitor, keyboard, mouse plugged directly into Raspberry Pi
Host Windows/Linux/Mac computer on same network as Raspberry Pi
Clone or download zip of the Python code for this tutorial from: Python Code for the Hardware and Software Tools for Precision Wideband Instrumentation Workshop
This probably isn’t necessary as of Kuiper 2022r2, but just in case you want to update pyadi-iio or have the examples in your home directory, run these commands in a terminal:
~$
git clone https://github.com/analogdevicesinc/pyadi-iio.git
~$
cd pyadi-iio
~/pyadi-iio$
sudo pip install .
Background
This tutorial builds on the concepts covered in: Introduction to the basic concepts of writing software to talk to external devices: Converter Connectivity Tutorial This tutorial that starts to deal with analyzing time series data: Precision ADC Tutorial And this workshop in which we actually build a simple test instrument: Tools for Low Speed Mixed Signal System Design
Slide Deck and Video
Since this tutorial is also designed to be presented as a live, hands-on workshop, a slide deck is provided here:
A complete video run-through is also provided, either as a companion to following the tutorial yourself, or to practice before presenting as a hands-on workshop:
Todo
Video and Slide Deck