Patent ID: 7141964

Claim:
A mixed signal detector for adaptively tracking amplitude boundary values of a sensor signal, said signal detector comprising: a digital storage device that stores an amplitude boundary value, said digital storage device comprising a counter having a one-bit increment input for incrementing said counter by one-bit in response to an increment signal and an m-bit increment input for incrementing said counter by m bits in response to an increment signal, wherein m is an integer greater than or equal to one, wherein the digitally stored amplitude boundary value comprises a peak boundary value or a min boundary value; a converter device for converting the digitally stored amplitude boundary value into a reference signal level corresponding in amplitude to the digitally stored amplitude boundary value and an offset reference signal level corresponding to the digitally stored amplitude boundary value incrementally offset by n, and comparator means for comparing the reference signal level and the offset reference signal level with the sensor signal and adjusting the digitally stored amplitude boundary value in response thereto, wherein said comparator means comprises a first comparator receiving the sensor signal and the reference signal level as inputs and a second comparator receiving the sensor signal and the offset reference signal as inputs, said first comparator having an output coupled to said one-bit increment input for incrementing said counter by one bit in response to said sensor signal exceeding said reference signal level but not exceeding said offset reference signal level and said second comparator having an output coupled to said m-bit increment input for incrementing said counter by m-bits in response to said sensor signal exceeding said offset reference signal level.