What do you mean by 4 channel ADC...Does it have 4 ADCs?

[jennisjose]

I know an ADC is used to convert analog to digital signal? It has properties like the sampling rate, the INL, DNL etc. But what does channel mean in a ADC?

Does it mean that a 4 channel ADc has 4 adcs??

 

[keith1200rs]

No, it usually means one ADC with a four channel analogue multiplexer.

Keith

 

[jennisjose]

@ Keith.....I did not understand that completely.

So if it is a 16 bit ADC.
Does a 4 channel ADC mean that it multiplexes the ADC output into 4 ...4 bit ADCs?
And if you want to use 2 channels the same ADc ..can be made as 2 8bit ADcs?

 

[keith1200rs]

No. A 16 bit 4 channel ADC had a 16 bit ADC and a 4 channel multiplexer. So you can connect 1, 2, 3 or 4 signals to it and measure each to 16 bit accuracy. Bear in mind it cannot measure the 4 signals simultaneously - you can only measure one at a time as you only have one ADC.

Keith