COMP 261 Digital Electronics Course Notes

A collection of flashcards reviewing key concepts in Digital Electronics to aid in exam preparation.

What is Digital Electronics?

A field of electronics involving the study of digital signals and the engineering of devices that use or produce them.

What are examples of digital electronics devices?

Computers, digital cameras, mobile phones, flash memory, digital television.

What is an Analog Signal?

A continuous signal whose amplitude can take any value between given limits and is aperiodic.

What is a Digital Signal?

A signal that changes amplitude in discrete steps with two values: 5V (logic High/bit 1) or 0V (logic Low/bit 0).

What is a nibble?

A digital signal with four bits.

What is the duty cycle?

The ratio of the time a signal is high to the total time period of the signal.

What is an A/D Converter?

Analog/Digital Converter that converts an analog signal to a digital signal.

What is a D/A Converter?

Digital/Analog Converter that converts a digital signal to an analog signal.

Define quantization in the context of ADC.

Converting discrete voltage levels of an analog signal into binary codes.

What does the term 'Logic Gates' refer to?

Basic components in digital circuits that perform logical operations on inputs.

What is the function of the NOT gate?

Inverts the input value: if input is 1, output is 0, and vice versa.

How does an OR Gate function?

Outputs high when at least one input is high.

How does an AND Gate function?

Outputs high only when all inputs are high.

What are universal gates? Give examples.

Gates that can be used to build any other gate; examples include NAND and NOR gates.

State De Morgan's First Theorem.

The complement of the union of two sets is equal to the intersection of the complements of each set.

State De Morgan's Second Theorem.

The complement of the intersection of two sets is equal to the union of the complements of each set.

What is the significance of K-map in digital electronics?

A graphical representation for simplifying Boolean expressions.

List the four basic arithmetic operations.

Addition, Subtraction, Multiplication, Division.

What does MSB and LSB stand for?

Most Significant Bit (MSB) and Least Significant Bit (LSB).

Define 2's Complement.

The binary number obtained by inverting all bits and adding one to the least significant bit.

What is a Half Adder?

A logic circuit that adds two bits producing a sum and a carry output.

Define a Flip-Flop.

A bistable circuit that can store one bit of digital information, changing states at clock edges.

Explain the difference between a latch and a Flip-Flop.

A latch is level-triggered and asynchronous, while a Flip-Flop is edge-triggered and synchronous.

What is a Full Adder?

A combinational logic circuit that adds three input bits (two data bits and a previous carry-in) producing a sum and a carry-out.

What is the primary function of a Multiplexer (MUX)?

A device that selects one of many input signals and routes it to a single output line, based on a set of selection inputs.

What is the main purpose of a Decoder circuit?

A combinational circuit that converts binary information from N input lines into a maximum of 2^N unique output lines.

What is a Register in digital electronics?

A group of flip-flops used to store multiple bits of binary data.

Differentiate between synchronous and asynchronous counters.

In a synchronous counter, all flip-flops are clocked simultaneously; in an asynchronous counter (ripple counter), the output of one flip-flop clocks the next one.