[time-nuts] Frequency Divider
Hal Murray
hmurray at megapathdsl.net
Thu Apr 2 20:06:40 UTC 2009
> JPL have used ECL dividers throughout to produce 10MHz, 1MHz and
> 100KHz outputs from the 100MHz signal derived from a Hydrogen maser:
> http://tmo.jpl.nasa.gov/progress_report2/42-30/30I.PDF
We've been discussion converting sine to TTL. JPL seems to be distributing
ECL rather than sine.
This seems like more bait for a FAQ.
What are the (dis)advantages of using ECL or TTL vs sine for distribution?
(I'm assuming "TTL" covers HC/AHC and 3V CMOS levels too.)
At the board level, digital designers often series terminate clocks. There
is no termination at the far end. There is a resistor between the (low
impedance) driver and the transmission line. The lock goes out at half
height and reflects off the far end. The sum of the outgoing edge and the
ref;ection give the input gate a clean full height signal. The resistor back
at the driver absorbs the reflection. That works great for point-to-point
links. It's a disaster for clocks if you have multiple receivers along the
transmission line since they see the signal at half height until the
reflection gets back to them, a great opportunity for multiple clocking.
Does that work OK for distribution via coax? If there is the classic 50 ohm
to ground input termination the signal will only be half height.
What are the properties of various conversion approaches?
how much noise/jitter is added?
how much leaks through from the power supply?
what is the phase drift with temperature?
I think the same questions are interesting for dividers using various
technologies. I think the simple divide by 2 with a FF covers all the
different combinations of gates and FFs if you use a retiming FF at the end.
--
These are my opinions, not necessarily my employer's. I hate spam.
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