Introduction

to
Digital
Electronics
Suplementary Reading
Digital Design
by - John F. Wakerly
www.ddpp.com - you will find some solutions at this site.
www.xilinx.com - Xlinix Web site
Logic and Computer Design Fundamentals
by - M. Morris Mano & Charles R. Kime
Digital Design
by - M. Morris Mano
Digital Logic Circuit Analysis and Design
by - Victor P. Nelson, H. Troy Nagle, J. David Irwin & Bill D. Carrol

Digital Electronics
Digital Electronics represents information (0, 1) with
only two discrete values.
Ideally
no voltage (e.g., 0v) represents a 0 and
full source voltage (e.g., 5v) represents a 1
Realistically
low voltage (e.g., <1v) represents a 0 and
high voltage (e.g., >4v) represents a 1
We achieve these discrete values by using switches.
We use transistor switches, which operates at high speed,
electronically, a small in size.

Analog versus Digital
Analog systems process time-varying signals that
can take on any value across a continuous range
of voltages (in electrical/electronics systems).
Digital systems process time-varying signals that
can take on only one of two discrete values of
voltages (in electrical/electronics systems).
Discrete values are called 1 and 0 (ON and OFF,
HIGH and LOW, TRUE and FALSE, etc.)

Representing Information Electronically
A light bulb has to represent 4 different
information:
Bulb off - no student inside
Bulb 1/3 lit - 1 student inside
Bulb 2/3 lit - 2 student inside
Bulb Full lit - 3 student inside

A light bulb has to represent 10 different
information:
Is it possible to differentiate the ten different light
intensity?
Representing Information Electronically
A light bulb has to represent 2 different information:
Bulb off - no student inside
Bulb Full lit - 1 student inside

A light bulb has to represent 4 different information:
How? With one bulb?
Use two bulbs

A light bulb has to represent 10 different information:
Use four bulbs
Representing Information Electronically
Analog electronics deals with non-discrete values

Digital electronics deals with discrete values

Benefits of Digital over Analog
Reproducibility
Not effected by noise means quality
Ease of design
Data protection
Programmable
Speed
Economy


Digital Revolution
Digital systems started back in 1940s.
Digital systems cover all areas of life:
still pictures
digital video
digital audio
telephone
traffic lights
Animation


Digital Devices
Gates
Flip-Flops
PLDs
FPGAs

Gates
The most basic digital devices are called gates.
Gates got their name from their function of
allowing or blocking (gating) the flow of digital
information.
A gate has one or more inputs and produces an
output depending on the input(s).
A gate is called a combinational circuit.
Three most important gates are: AND, OR, NOT

Digital Logic
Binary system -- 0 & 1, LOW & HIGH,
negated and asserted.
Basic building blocks -- AND, OR, NOT
AND, OR, NOT Gates


Electronic Aspects of Digital Design
How we represent digital information in electronic devices?
By discrete voltages.
What is the
Basic Digital Element
in Electronics
?
a Switch
Using Switch to represent digital information

Digital Abstraction
It is difficult to make ideal switches means a
switch is completely ON or completely OFF.
So, we impose some rules that allow analog
behavior to be ignored in most cases, so circuits
can be modeled as if they really did process 0s
and 1s, known as digital abstraction.
Digital abstraction allows us to associate a noise
margin with each logic values (0 and 1).
Real Switches to represent digital information

5v 5v
1k
10k
5v 4.5v
Output Output
Logic levels
Undefined region
is inherent
digital, not analog


Switching threshold varies with voltage, temp
need noise margin

Logic voltage levels decreasing with new processors.
5 , 3.3 , 2.5 , 1.8 V
MOS Transistors
NMOS
PMOS
Voltage-controlled resistance
CMOS Inverter

Switch model

Flip-flops
A device that stores either a 0 or 1.
Stored value can be changed only at certain times
determined by a clock input.
New value depend on the current state and its
control inputs
A digital circuit that contains filp-flops is called a
sequential circuit
Flip-flops

S-R latch symbols D flip-flop
J-K flip-flops
Integrated Circuits
A collection of one or more gates fabricated on a
single silicon chip is called an integrated circuit
(IC).
ICs were classified by size:
SSI - small scale integration - 1~20 gates
MSI - medium scale integration - 20~200 gates
LSI - large scale integration - 200~200,000 gates
VLSI - very large scale integration - over 1M
transistors
Pentium-III - 40 million transistors
DIP Packages

Gates in ICs

Programmable Logic Devices
PLDs allow the function to be programmed into
them after they are manufactured.
Complex PLDs (CPLD) are a collection of PLDs
on the same chip.
Another programmable logic chip is FPGA -
field-programmable gate arrays.
CPLDs and FPGAs

FPGA CPLD
Application Specific ICs (ASICs)
Chips designed for a particular application are
called semicustom ICs or application-specific ICs
(ASICs).
ASICs generally reduce the total component and
manufacturing cost of a product by reducing chip
count, physical size, and power consumption, and
they often provide higher performance.
But costly if not produced in bulk.
Printed-Circuit Boards
An IC is normally mounted on a printed-circuit
board (PCB) that connects it to other ICs in a
system.
Individual wire connection or traces can be as
narrow as 4 mils with 4 mils spacing (one-
thousandth of an inch)
Now a days, most of the components use surface
mount technology.
They are normally layered.
Software Aspects of Digital Design
Today software tools are an essential part of digital
design.
Software tools improve productivity, correctness and
quality of designs
Software tools are:
Schematic entry
HDL (Hardware Description Language) Editors
Simulators - to verify the behaviour of the design
Synthesis tools - circuit design
Timing analyzers and verifiers
Digital Design Levels
the lowest level of design is device physics and
IC manufacturing processes.
design at the transistor level
level of functional building blocks
level of logic design using HDLs
computer design and overall system design.

Different Design Levels
Consider a simple design example:

Build a multiplexer with two data inputs A and B, a
control input S, and an output Z.
Switch model for the example multiplexer
Designing at the transistor level
Transistor-level
circuit diagrams





Gate symbols (for simple elements)
Logic design
using Truth tables





Logic design
using boolean algebra
Equations: Z = S A + S B


Logic diagrams
Prepackaged building blocks, e.g. multiplexer

Various
hardware
description
languages
ABEL



VHDL

Well start with
gates and work
our way up


Name of the program
module
the type of PLD
pin numbers
ABEL statement to
achieve the
multiplexer


Standard library
and a set of definitions

Inputs and outputs

functions behaviour


Structural VHDL program for the multiplexer


Summery
Design to minimize cost.
Rule of thumb is to minimize the number of ICs.
Though PLDs costs more but uses less PCB area.
Unless mass production avoid ASIC design.
Design to solve real life problems.