High Performance Signal Acquisition with a 16b Microcontroller

This paper deals with the combination of a powerful 16b microcontroller and a high precision signal acquisition unit. Traditionally, a digital technology, a fast, complex processing unit and precise analog signal handling have been regarded to be incompatible. For the first time a true 10 channel 10 bit A/D converter capable of handling analog signals up to several 100 kHz and with a total unadjusted error <; +-0.5 LSB has been implemented on a 250k transistor controller /1/. Implementation details as well as measured results are presented.