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Altera_Forum's avatar
Altera_Forum
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16 years ago

Fast DAC for a pulse generator

Hello to all,

I need to design a pulse generator that is capable of pulse widths of 2 ns or less. The pulse repetition frequency is 300kHz or even slower. I also need to sample a signal derived from the output of the pulse generator. Can anyone recommend an Altera platform with a DAC and ADC that can sample that fast?

Thanks in advance.

Your help is very much appreciated.

1 Reply

  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
    Icon for Honored Contributor rankHonored Contributor
    16 years ago

    Altera has no Dev. Kits in this speed range. The fastest is Stratix III DSP Kit with 250 MSPS DAC and 150 MSPS ADC. Also I'm not aware of a third party product. So you possibly need to design it yourself.

    I designed a test system hardware, that involves a 500 MSPS 16 Bit DAC (MAX 5888A), but you can get DAC at 1 GSPS and above, e.g. from Analog. At this speeds, the DAC datastream must be generated by serializers and send through LVDS.