DAC for High Speed and Low Power Applications Using Abacus

Abstract

This paper proposes a Chinese Abacus Digital-to-Analog Converter (DAC) for high speed and low power applications like audio and video applications. This circuit of DAC uses resister strings to get a good analog output. The designed DAC uses the algorithm of abacus. Instead of using binary code, here we use abacus code to control the switches. So the complexity and the area will be reduced automatically. The 8-bit DAC is comprised of 12 resistors and 24 NMOS switches. The 8-bit Abacus resistor DAC requires 12 resistors and 24 switches. The 8-bit resistor-string DAC requires 255 resistors and 256 switches. The most important advantages are that the numbers of both resistors and switches are all reduced effectively. The simulation environment uses 1 µm process technology.