Development of a data acquistion board for measuring HDD signals

Abstract

The rapid improvement of digital technology leads to its frequent uses in monitoring systems. Data from external world is read, processed, and, eventually, output by a digital system. This paper presents development of a data acquisition board which communicates with computers via USB port. In the same board, a Low Noise Amplifier (LNA) will be incorporated in order to make this board suitable for measuring hard disk reader signals. The system is composed of a low noise amplifier, an Analog to Digital Converter (ADC), a controller unit and USB controller. The LNA has a gain of 10 V/V, and a bandwidth of 300 MHz. Its 12-bit ADC samples an input at 240 MSPS, 70 microseconds consecutively every 100 millisecond cycle.