On the Procedure of Finding the ENOB in ADC Converters

Nowadays analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) are widely used and can be found in various applications that require the conversion of analog signals to the digital domain. Despite the abundance of literature on ADC design, there is little information regarding the accurate characterization of these devices, resulting in common errors when simulating and determining their key parameters, especially for the most important one, the effective number of bits (ENOB). This papers provides a comprehensive guide on the proper characterization of the ENOB in ADCs. Also, this work highlights the most common errors during the acquisition and processing of the output data coming from the ADC's simulation.