Analog Input Background

Analog to Digital Converter

Signal voltages are not always digital, such as zero volts or five volts. Many times, they are analog. They can vary in voltage level and that is where an Analog-to-Digital converter is used to convert the input signal from an analog voltage level to a digital value that the microcontroller can process.

The Analog-to-Digital Converter (ADC) can convert an analog input signal to a 10-bit binary digital representation of that signal. The microcontroller's analog inputs are multiplexed into a single sample and hold circuit. The output of the sample and hold is connected to the input of the ADC. The ADC generates the 10-bit binary result via successive approximation and stores the conversion result into the ADC result registers.