Patent ID: 7847718

Claim:
A digital-to-analog converter comprising: a reference voltage generating circuit that outputs m (where m is an integer greater than or equal to 4) reference voltages having voltage values which differ from one another; a decoder that receives a digital signal and the m reference voltages, and selects and outputs n (where n is an integer greater than or equal to 3) identical or different reference voltages from among the m reference voltages on the basis of the received digital signal; and an amplifying circuit that receives the selected n voltages and outputs to an output terminal, a voltage obtained by taking a weighted mean of the received n voltages at a ratio of 2 n−1 :2 n−2 : . . . :2 0 ; wherein a maximum of m m voltage levels that differ from one another are allowed to be output to the output terminal in accordance with the received digital signal.