Patent ID: 8744037

Claim:
A divider for providing an output signal having an output frequency by dividing a reference frequency of a reference signal by a divider value, the divider comprising: a chain of divider elements comprising at least: a first divider element configured to receive the reference signal and provide a first divider output signal having a first divider output signal frequency which is half of the reference frequency; a last divider element configured to receive a preceding divider output signal having a preceding divider output signal frequency from a preceding divider element in the chain and provide a last divider output signal having a last divider output signal frequency which is half of the preceding divider output signal frequency; and an output signal provider configured to provide the output signal, wherein the output signal provider is configured to: determine toggle states based on the divider value, wherein each toggle state is associated with a toggling of the output signal and comprises a first bit associated with the first divider output signal and a last bit associated with the last divider output signal, wherein the bits are indicative of certain properties of the associated divider output signals, verify that an actual property of the last divider output signal corresponds to the certain property indicated by the last bit associated with the last divider output signal, subsequently, upon this verification, further verify that the actual property of the first divider output signal corresponds to the certain property indicated by the first bit associated with the first divider output signal, and subsequently, upon this further verification, toggle the output signal at a predetermined edge in the reference signal.