The Designer's Guide Community
Forum
Welcome, Guest. Please Login or Register. Please follow the Forum guidelines.
Mar 29th, 2024, 3:27am
Pages: 1
Send Topic Print
VCO with ring oscillators (Read 96 times)
skt
New Member
*
Offline



Posts: 5

VCO with ring oscillators
Oct 14th, 2003, 8:24pm
 
Hi all,
          I am designing a 3 stage VCO using ring oscillators  in spectre.  I am trying to find the frequency of oscillation by doing a transient analysis.
        the problem is the circuit never oscillates. spectre always seems to find a valid bias point.
       Do i need to trigger the circuit using some sort of impulse ( i know  how to do it in pspice, but not in cadence) or is something wrong in my circuit.  
        Any suggestions ......
thanks
surya
Back to top
 
 
View Profile   IP Logged
Paul
Community Fellow
*****
Offline



Posts: 351
Switzerland
Re: VCO with ring oscillators
Reply #1 - Oct 14th, 2003, 11:44pm
 
Hi Surya,

in reality (on a chip), an oscillator always starts up from noise. So I would say you must probably trigger your oscillator to start up with some small perturbation. If I remember correctly, a 3-stage oscillator has a worse start-up than higher order ring oscillators. So maybe you can in a first time try to increase the number of stages to compare, although this will reduce the frequency of oscillation.

Paul
Back to top
 
 
View Profile WWW   IP Logged
Ken Kundert
Global Moderator
*****
Offline



Posts: 2384
Silicon Valley
Re: VCO with ring oscillators
Reply #2 - Oct 15th, 2003, 1:19am
 
I have a whole section in my book discussing this topic. But the simple answer is yes, you need to perturb the oscillator to get it to start. With ring oscillators, the easiest way to do that is to apply an initial condition to the oscillator.

-Ken
Back to top
 
 
View Profile WWW   IP Logged
circuit_master_RT
New Member
*
Offline



Posts: 3

Re: VCO with ring oscillators
Reply #3 - Oct 26th, 2003, 12:12am
 
The above answers are good, but no one has mentioned the usage of a current source with a pulse or step waveform.  The current source as an oscillation starter is nice since it does not change the impedance of the node you attach to, and you can put a very small amplitude "kick" to get the oscillator started, and observe the oscillation growing and then limiting in amplitude.
Back to top
 
 
View Profile   IP Logged
Ken Kundert
Global Moderator
*****
Offline



Posts: 2384
Silicon Valley
Re: VCO with ring oscillators
Reply #4 - Oct 27th, 2003, 9:46am
 
In my experience, a sinusoidal source that drives the circuit at the resonant frequency and that has a exponential decay works quite well, particularly for resonant oscillators. For ring oscillators, I find that using an initial condition on one stage works best. But either approach should be adequate.

One thing I have seen people try on ring oscillators that I don't recommend is to jiggle the supply voltage.  This injects a signal into all stages symmetrically, which does not do a good job of stimulating the oscillation.

-Ken
Back to top
 
 
View Profile WWW   IP Logged
storm
New Member
*
Offline



Posts: 2
Singapore
Re: VCO with ring oscillators
Reply #5 - Feb 11th, 2004, 6:46am
 
I am also working on ring oscillator, with 2-stage. Hard to start oscillation. I just put an additional vsin in the circuit separately instead of a ipulse to kick-start the circuit. i mean, there is no any physical connection between such vsin and the circuit under test.

It works.
Back to top
 
 
View Profile   IP Logged
emad
Junior Member
**
Offline



Posts: 30
Cairo, Egypt
Re: VCO with ring oscillators
Reply #6 - Feb 21st, 2004, 9:49am
 
I think the best starter is the use of initial conditions. As Ken mentioned and elaborated in his book, kicking through the supply lines is not advisable whether it is ring or LC based oscillator. The supply node is typically slow and kicking the oscillator through it can cause long-lasting transients, especially for high Q ones.
Most people like the current source that decays. I don't. Some people think it is the only method that works for crytal oscillators, I don't think so. Initial conditions seem to produce the fastest convergence in my experience.

Emad
Back to top
 
 
View Profile   IP Logged
eggleg
New Member
*
Offline



Posts: 1

Re: VCO with ring oscillators
Reply #7 - Mar 10th, 2004, 11:45pm
 
I just wonder what are initial conditions here.
In my case, I have four ring oscillators.
And .ic v(voutp)=pvdd v(voutn)=0
are my initial condition.
Is it a correct way?
I have no problem to get starting oscillation.

- Jacky Z.Lin
Back to top
 
 
View Profile   IP Logged
Pages: 1
Send Topic Print
Copyright 2002-2024 Designer’s Guide Consulting, Inc. Designer’s Guide® is a registered trademark of Designer’s Guide Consulting, Inc. All rights reserved. Send comments or questions to editor@designers-guide.org. Consider submitting a paper or model.