Patent Document

RELATED APPLICATION  
       [0001]    This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/206,191, filed on May 22, 2000. The entire teachings of the above application(s) are incorporated herein by reference. 
     
    
     
       BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION  
         [0002]    Monolithic data recovery phase locked loops (PLLs) require a large frequency capture range, due to the large frequency deviations of on-chip voltage-controlled oscillators (VCOs) caused by extensive process variations. As the capture range of a loop using only phase correction is limited, a frequency acquisition aid must be used.  
           [0003]    One method that has been used is to directly measure the frequency of the VCO output, and when it is close to the target frequency, switch control of the VCO to the data recovery PLL. However, this requires extremely fast circuitry, especially at the high speeds (multi-gigabits per second) required in typical high-speed communication links.  
         SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION  
         [0004]    The design employed by the present invention offers a new frequency acquisition technique which helps the main recovery PLL lock to data stream under considerable process variations.  
           [0005]    Accordingly, a frequency monitor includes an edge detector which produces a pulse for each rising or falling edge of an error signal. The error signal itself has a frequency that is responsive to a difference between frequencies of two input signals. A resistive circuit has an effective average resistance that depends on the rate or frequency of the edge detector output pulses. A capacitor holds a charge that depends on the effective average resistance of the resistive circuit. Finally, an indicator circuit produces an output based on the charge held by the capacitor. The indicator circuit output indicates whether the difference between the two input signal frequencies is less than some predetermined amount.  
           [0006]    The resistive circuit is implemented in one embodiment as a switched capacitor circuit that charges and discharges at a rate that depends on the rate of the edge detector output pulses.  
           [0007]    The indicator circuit is implemented in one embodiment as a comparator that produces the indicator circuit output, which is at one of two levels based on the charge and some threshold, where one level indicating that the difference between the two input signal frequencies is less than a predetermined amount, and the second level indicating that said difference is greater than a predetermined amount.  
           [0008]    Furthermore, a selector, responsive to the indicator circuit output, selects from plural sources, for example, a data phase detector circuit and a frequency acquisition circuit, to control an oscillator. The oscillator may be, for example, a voltage-controlled oscillator. It produces a clock signal at a sampling frequency, which is used by the detector circuit to receive data.  
           [0009]    The frequency acquisition circuit compares the clock signal with a reference clock to produce a frequency acquisition output indicative of the difference between the frequencies of the reference clock and the oscillator clock signal. The output is one of the sources to the selector.  
           [0010]    The data phase detector circuit compares the clock signal with a rate of incoming data to produce a data phase detector output indicative of the difference between the frequencies of the reference clock and the incoming data. The output another one of the sources to the selector.  
           [0011]    In at least one embodiment, the data phase detector circuit output comprises the error signal.  
           [0012]    In an alternate embodiment, the error signal is formed by a combiner circuit which combines the two input signals. For example, the combiner circuit can include a mixer which mixes the two input signals to produce a mixed signal, followed by a low-pass filter which filters the mixed signal to produce the error signal.  
           [0013]    One advantage of the present invention is that the maximum frequency found in the present invention is equal to the difference between the frequencies of the input signal and the reference clock, which is considerably lower than the signal frequency. Thus, the acquisition loop can operate using standard CMOS technology.  
           [0014]    Another advantage is that the frequency acquisition technique of the present invention can be used with any PLL regardless of its architecture. In other words, it is compatible with almost any PLL architecture.  
           [0015]    Yet another advantage is that the existence of an input signal and frequency lock condition can be detected.  
           [0016]    Finally, the overall architecture requires a very low transistor count and complexity. 
       
    
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS  
       [0017]    The foregoing and other objects, features and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following more particular description of preferred embodiments of the invention, as illustrated in the accompanying drawings in which like reference characters refer to the same parts throughout the different views. The drawings are not necessarily to scale, emphasis instead being placed upon illustrating the principles of the invention.  
         [0018]    [0018]FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a combined phase detector and frequency acquisition loop, with the frequency monitor of an embodiment of the present invention.  
         [0019]    [0019]FIG. 2 is a simplified schematic diagram for the frequency monitor of FIG. 1.  
         [0020]    [0020]FIG. 3 is a schematic for the mixer of FIG. 2.  
         [0021]    [0021]FIG. 4 is a simplified schematic diagram for the edge detector of FIG. 2.  
         [0022]    [0022]FIG. 5 is a schematic for the hysteresis circuit of FIG. 4.  
         [0023]    [0023]FIG. 6 is a block diagram of a combined phase detector and frequency acquisition loop, with the frequency monitor of an alternate embodiment of the present invention.  
         [0024]    [0024]FIG. 7 is a simplified schematic diagram for the frequency monitor of FIG. 6. 
     
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION  
       [0025]    [0025]FIG. 1 shows a phase detector circuit  4  together with the frequency acquisition circuit  2 .  
         [0026]    A voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO)  10  produces a sampling clock  6  at a frequency determined by a control voltage  8 . The control voltage is driven by either the phase detector circuit  4  or the frequency acquisition circuit  2 , as selected by the frequency monitor  28  through selector  32 .  
         [0027]    In the data phase detector circuit  4 , a data recovery phase detector  12  determines the phase offset of data in an input stream  14  with respect to the sampling clock  6  and produces an error signal Ver which is indicative of this phase offset. The output signal  13  drives a first charge pump  18 . The output of the charge pump  18 , if selected by selector  32 , is filtered by loop filter  20 , resulting in the VCO control voltage  8 .  
         [0028]    At chip start-up, the frequency acquisition circuit  2  helps the phase detector circuit  4  acquire lock to a reference clock  34 , which is typically available for transmitter clock generation. A standard phase/frequency detector  24  compares the reference clock  34  with the VCO output  6 , or a sub-harmonic thereof, and produces a voltage  25  indicative of the frequency difference between the two signals. This voltage  25  then drives a second charge pump  26  whose output, if selected by selector  32 , is filtered by loop filter  20 , resulting in the VCO control voltage  8 .  
         [0029]    The frequency acquisition circuit  2  thus acts to rapidly force the VCO to operate close to the reference clock  34  frequency. During this time, selector  32  connects the second charge pump  26  to the loop filter  20  so that the frequency acquisition circuit  2  is driving the VCO  10 .  
         [0030]    The frequency monitor  28  continuously compares the frequency f φref  of the reference clock φ ref , which is close to the incoming data frequency, to the frequency f φvco  of the VCO output φ vco    6 , and keeps the frequency acquisition circuit  2  active as long as the difference between the two frequencies, i.e., f er =f φref −f φvco , is greater than the frequency capture range of the data recovery circuit  14 . When the frequency difference f er  is less than the data recovery circuit capture range, the frequency monitor  28  asserts an indicator signal V Q    30  which causes selector  32  to switch the loop control from the frequency acquisition circuit  2  to the data recovery circuit  4 .  
         [0031]    [0031]FIG. 2 presents a simplified schematic of the frequency monitor  28  of FIG. 1. A mixer  40  combines the reference clock φ ref  (with frequency f φref ) and the VCO output φ vco  (having frequency f φvco ) frequencies to produce a signal V out  that contains two frequency components: f φref −f φvco  and f φref +f f   100 vco . A low-pass filter  42  following the mixer suppresses the component at f φref +f φvco  and passes the component at f φvco  in its output V er .  
         [0032]    Edge detector  50  generates a full-swing pulse at  51  corresponding to each edge of V er  at its input. Thus, the output of the edge detector  50  is a train of pulses at twice the input frequency f er .  
         [0033]    The output of the edge detector, shown as dotted line  51 , is applied to a switched-capacitor circuit as shown in the dashed box  52  of FIG. 2, comprising capacitor C 1  and two complementary switches  53 A and  53 B, in which one switch turns off when the other switch is on. The effective conductance of the switched-capacitor structure is proportional to the value of capacitance C 1  and the input frequency: 
           G   switchedcap   =C   1   ·f   er   (Eq. 1) 
         [0034]    and the effective resistance of the structure is:  
               R   switchedcap     =     1       C   1     ·     f   er                 (Eq.  2)                               
 
         [0035]    Capacitor C 2  is placed at the output of the switched-capacitor structure to reduce the switching noise to the input V sw  of comparator  58 . The fixed current source  56  supplies a constant current I into the switched-capacitor circuit  52 . Thus, the voltage V sw  is equal to: 
           V   sw   =R   switchedcap   ·I   (Eq. 3) 
         [0036]    If there is a sufficient difference between the frequencies of the VCO clock  6  and the frequency f φref  of the reference clock φ ref , i.e., if f er  is sufficiently large, the edge detector  50  generates pulses at a high-frequency rate that result in high conductance/low resistance (Equations 1 and 2) of the switched-capacitor structure. The current source I  56  is adjusted such that for f er  larger than a certain threshold, i.e., larger than the frequency capture range of the main data recovery loop, the switched-capacitor circuit  52  maintains the voltage V sw  below the threshold of comparator  58 . Thus, the comparator output V Q  is held at 0. Referring back to FIG. 1, this value of V Q  will direct selector  32  to allow the frequency acquisition circuit  4  to control the VCO  10 .  
         [0037]    When f er  drops below a certain threshold, indicating that the VCO output frequency is within the data recovery capture range, the pulse rate of the edge detector  50  decreases such that the resistance of the switched-capacitor circuit  52  increases. The voltage V sw  thus rises above the threshold of the comparator  58 . The comparator output V Q  becomes 1, and the selector  32  hands loop control to the data phase detector circuit  2 .  
         [0038]    The frequency acquisition circuit  4  will become active again, i.e., reselected, if the VCO frequency drifts away from the target frequency (that is, f φref , which is the same or very close to the expected data frequency) by more than a certain amount.  
         [0039]    One major benefit of this embodiment is that it can be used with any type of data recovery loop circuit, independent of its architecture and data phase detector.  
         [0040]    [0040]FIG. 3 is a circuit schematic for the mixer  40  of FIG. 2. A differential VCO output  6 A,  6 B is applied to transistors  60 - 63 . A differential reference clock signal  34 A,  34 B is applied to the respectively to the gates of transistors  60  and  63 , and  61  and  62 . Note that the gate controls of transistors  61  and  63  are inverted. The effect is that φ vco  is modulated by φ ref , such that the differential output V out  contains frequency components which are the sum and difference of the corresponding frequencies f φvco  and f φref .  
         [0041]    [0041]FIG. 4 is a block diagram of the edge detector  50  of FIG. 2. As FIG. 4 illustrates, the edge detector  50  is designed to have a hysteresis characteristic  70 , using positive feedback in its first stage amplifier  78 . Thus, it reacts only to oscillation amplitudes larger than a certain threshold level. This helps to prevent erroneous transitions due to noise.  
         [0042]    For example, at  80  is shown a signal oscillating with an amplitude larger than the necessary threshold level. The hysteresis circuit  70  magnifies the oscillations as shown at  82 . A level converter  72  converts the oscillations to square pulses  84 , while the combination of delay  74  and XOR gate  76  create a pulse for each transition of the output  85  of the level converter  72 , as shown at  86 .  
         [0043]    On the other hand, at  90  is shown a noise signal with an amplitude which is less than the threshold level. Resulting waveforms shown at  92 ,  94  and  96  respectively, illustrate that the circuit does not respond to this noise  90 .  
         [0044]    [0044]FIG. 5 is a circuit schematic of the hysteresis circuit  70  of FIG. 4. Current source  104  draws current through the circuit. A differential front-end amplifier, comprising devices  102 , modulates based on the input signal, which corresponds to the output V out  of the mixer  28  of FIG. 3. A diode-connected PMOS device  101  in series with each input amplifier  102  acts as an active resistor. In parallel with each diode-connected device  101  is a second PMOS device  103  which is biased by a cross-coupling to the other side of the differential circuit, to provide positive feedback. To ensure hysteresis behavior in the front-end amplifier, i.e., devices  102 , the size W 2  of the cross-coupled PMOS devices  103  should be larger than the size W 1  of the diode-connected PMOS devices  101 .  
         [0045]    The present invention can be used with any PLL regardless of its architecture. It can thus be used to recover the frequency information of random-pattern data, which is not possible using conventional phase-frequency detectors. In addition, this design is suitable for very high-speed application, as it operates at a much lower speed than the high-speed input signal, and can be implemented using standard CMOS technology. Another benefit is that the overall architecture requires a very low transistor count and complexity.  
         [0046]    A second embodiment is illustrated in FIGS. 6 and 7. In this embodiment, the frequency monitor  28  uses cycle-slipping information from an analog data phase detector  112  to indicate when the VCO&#39;s output frequency is different from that of the incoming data. Such an analog data phase detector is described in a U.S. Patent Application, filed on the even day herewith, entitled “A LIEAR DATA PHASE RECOVER DETECTOR” to Ramin Faijad-Raj, attorney&#39;s docket number 2789.2017-000.  
         [0047]    During cycle-slipping, sweeping of the VCO clock phases over the data stream causes the phase detector output Ver  16  to oscillate between “early” and “late” signals. The frequency of this oscillation (sweep speed) is equal to the frequency difference between the receive clock and the incoming data.  
         [0048]    This V er  can be used directly by a frequency monitor  128  which is appropriately modified from that of FIGS. 1 and 2. Thus, in this embodiment, the frequency monitor  128  does not need direct access to the VCO output  6  and the reference clock  34 .  
         [0049]    [0049]FIG. 7 is a block diagram of the modified frequency monitor  128 . It is essentially the same as that of FIG. 2, with the exception that the mixer and low-pass filter are no longer needed.  
         [0050]    While this invention has been particularly shown and described with references to preferred embodiments thereof, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes in form and details may be made therein without departing from the scope of the invention encompassed by the appended claims.

Technology Category: h