Digital Electronics
LECTURE 1 - INTRODUCTION
Kwame Oteng Gyasi
0544478819
kermaabar@yahoo.com
• QUIZZES ---- 5%
• ASSIGNMENTS --- 10%
• MIDSEM ---- 15%
• EXAMS ---- 70%
SUBJECT TO CHANGE***
• Electronic circuits can be divided into two broad
categories, digital and analog. Digital electronics
involve quantities with discrete values, and analog
electronics involve quantities with continuous
values.
• An analog* quantity is one having continuous
values. A digital quantity is one having a discrete
set of values. Most things that can be measured
quantitatively occur in nature in analog form. Eg.
Pressure, Sound, time, distance
• Does temperature change instantaneously during
the day?
Why Digital?
• Digital representation has certain advantages over
analog representation in electronics applications.
• For one thing, digital data can be processed and
transmitted more efficiently and reliably than
analog data.
• Also, digital data has a great advantage when
storage is necessary. Eg. Storage of music
• Noise (unwanted voltage fluctuations) does not
affect digital data nearly as much as it does analog
signals. Eg. TV
Analog System
The diagram above illustrates how a PA system works.
• Sound waves, which are analog in nature, are picked up by a microphone and
converted to a small analog voltage called the audio signal.
• This voltage varies continuously as the volume and frequency of the sound changes and is
applied to the input of a linear amplifier.
• The output of the amplifier, which is an increased reproduction of the input voltage, goes to
the speaker(s).
• The speaker changes the amplified audio signal back to sound waves that have a
much greater volume than the original sound waves picked up by the microphone.
System Using both Analog and Digital Methods
The simplified block diagram above illustrates the basic principle of a CD player.
• Music in digital form is stored on the compact disk.
• A laser diode optical system picks up the digital data from the rotating disk and transfers it to
the digital-to-analog converter (DAC).
• The DAC changes the digital data into an analog signal that is an electrical reproduction
of the original music.
• This signal is amplified and sent to the speaker for you to enjoy.
PS: When the music was originally recorded on the CD, a process, essentially the reverse
of the one described here, using an analog-to-digital converter (ADC) was used.
• Digital electronics involves circuits and systems in
which there are only two possible states.
• These states are represented by two different voltage
levels: A HIGH and a LOW.
• ***(+ve and –ve logic)***
• The two states can also be represented by current
levels, bits and bumps on a CD or DVD, etc.
• In digital systems such as computers, combinations
of the two states, called codes, are used to represent
numbers, symbols, alphabetic characters, and other
types of information.
• The two-state number system is called binary, and its
two digits are 0 and 1. A binary digit is called a bit.
Logic Levels
• The voltages used to represent a 1 and a 0 are called logic levels.
Ideally, one voltage level represents a HIGH and another voltage level
represents a LOW.
• In a practical digital circuit, however, a HIGH can be any voltage
between a specified minimum value and a specified maximum value.
• Likewise, a LOW can be any voltage between a specified minimum
and a specified maximum. There can be no overlap between the
accepted range of HIGH levels and the accepted range of LOW levels.
Digital Waveform
• Digital waveforms consist of voltage levels that are changing back and
forth between the HIGH and LOW levels or states.
• The Figure above shows that a single positive-going pulse is generated
when the voltage (or current) goes from its normally LOW level to its
HIGH level and then back to its LOW level.
• The negative-going pulse in Figure 1–7(b) is generated when the
voltage goes from its normally HIGH level to its LOW level and back to
its HIGH level. A digital waveform is made up of a series of pulses.
Waveform Xtics
• Most waveforms encountered in digital systems are composed of series of pulses,
sometimes called pulse trains, and can be classified as either periodic or non-
periodic.
• A periodic pulse waveform is one that repeats itself at a fixed interval, called a
period (T).
• The frequency ( f ) is the rate at which it repeats itself and is measured in hertz
(Hz).
• A non-periodic pulse waveform, of course, does not repeat itself at fixed intervals
and may be composed of pulses of randomly differing pulse widths and/or
randomly differing time intervals between the pulses.
• An important characteristic of a periodic digital waveform is its duty cycle, which is
the ratio of the pulse width (tW) to the period (T ). It is normally expressed as a
percentage
Example 1
1. A portion of a periodic digital waveform is shown in the
Figure below.
The measurements are in milliseconds. Determine the following:
(a) period (10ms) (b) frequency (100Hz) (c) duty cycle (10%)
Tip: The period (T) is measured from the edge of one pulse to the
corresponding edge of the next pulse.
Basic Logic Functions
• In its basic form, logic is the realm of human
reasoning that tells you a certain proposition
(declarative statement) is true if certain conditions
are true.
• In the 1850s, the Irish logician and mathematician
George Boole developed a mathematical system for
formulating logic statements with symbols so that
problems can be written and solved in a manner
similar to ordinary algebra.
• Three basic logic functions (NOT, AND, and OR) are
indicated by standard distinctive shape symbols.
• A circuit that performs a specified logic function
(AND, OR, NOT) is called a logic gate.
• Each of the three basic logic functions produces a
unique response to a given set of conditions
• NOT GATE
• AND GATE
• OR GATE
Extra topics
• A flip-flop is a bistable (two stable states) logic
circuit that can store only one bit at a time, either a
1 or a 0. The output of a flip-flop indicates which bit
it is storing. A HIGH output indicates that a 1 is
stored and a LOW output indicates that a 0 is stored.
• A register is formed by combining several flip-flops
so that groups of bits can be stored. For example,
an 8-bit register is constructed from eight flip-flops.
In addition to storing bits, registers can be used to
shift the bits from one position to another within
the register or out of the register to another circuit;
therefore, these devices are known as shift registers.
Memories
• Optical Memories: CDs, DVDs, and Blu-ray Discs are
storage devices based on laser technology. Data are
represented by pits and lands on concentric tracks.
A laser beam is used to store the data on the disc
and to read the data from the disc.
• Semiconductor memories are devices typically used
for storing large numbers of bits. In one type of
memory, called the read-only memory or ROM, the
binary data are permanently or semi-permanently
stored and cannot be readily changed. In the
random-access memory or RAM, the binary data
are temporarily stored and can be easily changed.
Assignment (due next week {11.2.2019})
1. Define analog.
2. Define digital.
3. Explain the difference between a digital quantity and an analog
quantity.
4. Give an example of a system that is analog and one that is a
combination of both digital and analog. Name a system that is
entirely digital.
5. A periodic digital waveform has a pulse width of 25 μs and a
period of 150 μs. Determine the frequency and the duty cycle.
QUIZ (1 minute)
1. What are the four basic arithmetic
operations?
HAVE A GREAT WEEK. 下周见 !!!
