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An actual technical post/question, just for a change of pace....

I'm looking for some references or answers about what happens to distortion in digital systems as the level is lowered.

Here's what I know so far (or think I know...)

An undithered digital system exhibits increasing distortion of a simple sine wave as the signal level drops, with a spectrum that appears to have similar levels of all harmonics.

Question: Since this is a numerically-predictable situation, what is the function that describes the distortion spectrum at a given level? Are all harmonics present in equal quantities? If not, what does the envelope look like?

I was told that a dithered digital system eliminates these harmonics, essentially turning the harmomic distortion components into noise.

Question:Is this correct? Is it true that a dithered system exhibits no artifacts that are harmonically-related to the signal?

I know this is a wild departure from the normal mud-slinging mode, but I thought it might be worth trying to get a technical discussion going....

Peter

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Topic - An actual technical post/question, just for a change of pace.... - Commuteman 10:43:24 11/08/05 (173)
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