Histogram-Based Techniques for ADC Testing

Over the past 20 years, researchers both in academia and in industry have carried out a large amount of research on the topic of Data Converter Testing. The motivations are both economical and technical. In fact, both the high percentage of testing costs over total production costs and the large increase in the market demand for both Analog-To-Digital (ADC) and digital-to-analog converters have justified investigations and development of new and more efficient testing methods. On the technical side, the problem of data converter testing is challenging for several reasons, such as the nonlinear behavior of the quantizer inside an ADC and the ever-increasing sampling rate. Test engineers have also been challenged both in modeling the test process and in actual implementation of testing procedures. Both sides of this issue are important: modeling brings about new insights in the solution of practical testing problems and, conversely, experimental results help validate and improve models accuracy and usability.