A Novel Architecture of Pseudorandom Dithered MASH Digital Delta-Sigma Modulator with Lower Spur

Abstract

A Digital Delta Sigma Modulator (DDSM) is a Finite State Machine (FSM); it is implemented using finite precision arithmetic units and the number of available states is finite. The DDSM always produces a periodic output signal when the input is constant. This paper proposes a novel method of applying periodic dither to a DDSM in order to obtain minimized spurious tones. The effects of adding the pseudorandom dither signal in different stages within the proposed Multi-Stage noise Shaping (MASH) modulator are expressed in the equations, and the results are compared. We present results regarding the periodicity of the quantization noise produced by a MASH modulator with a constant input and a pseudorandom dither signal. The performance is confirmed mathematically, and by simulation.