DS3106
8
4. Detailed Description
Figure 3-1 illustrates the blocks described in this section and how they relate to one another. Section
5 provides a
detailed feature list.
The DS3106 is a complete line card timing IC. At the core of this device is a digital phase-locked loop (DPLL).
DPLL technology makes use of digital-signal processing (DSP) and digital-frequency synthesis (DFS) techniques to
implement PLLs that are precise, flexible, and have consistent performance over voltage, temperature, and
manufacturing process variations. The DS3106’s T0
1
DPLL is digitally configurable for input and output
frequencies, loop bandwidth, damping factor, pull-in/hold-in range, and a variety of other factors. The T0 DPLL can
directly lock to many common telecom frequencies and also can lock at 8kHz to any multiple of 8kHz up to
156.25MHz. The DPLL can also tolerate and filter significant amounts of jitter and wander.
In typical line card applications, the T0 DPLL takes reference clock signals from two redundant system timing
cards, monitors both, selects one, and uses that reference to produce a variety of clocks that are needed to time
the outgoing traffic interfaces of the line card (SONET/SDH, Synchronous Ethernet, etc.). To perform this role in a
variety of systems with diverse performance requirements, the T0 DPLL has a sophisticated feature set and is
highly configurable. T0 can automatically transition among free-run, locked, and holdover states without software
intervention. In free-run, T0 generates a stable, low-noise clock with the same frequency accuracy as the external
oscillator connected to the REFCLK pin. With software calibration the DS3106 can even improve the accuracy to
within
±0.02ppm. When the selected input reference clock has been validated, T0 transitions to the locked state in
which its output clock accuracy is equal to the accuracy of the input reference. While in the locked state, T0
acquires an average frequency value to use as the holdover frequency. When its selected reference fails, T0 can
very quickly detect the failure and enter the holdover state to avoid affecting its output clock. From holdover it can
be manually switched to another input reference. When all input references are lost, T0 stays in the holdover state,
in which it generates a stable low-noise clock with initial frequency accuracy equal to its stored holdover value and
drift performance determined by the quality of the external oscillator.
At the front end of the T0 DPLL is the Input Clock Selector, Divider, and Monitor (ICSDM) block. This block
continuously monitors both input clocks for activity and coarse frequency accuracy. In addition, ICSDM can
manually select one of the input clocks to be the selected reference for the T0 DPLL. The ICSDM block can also
divide the selected clock down to a lower rate as needed by the DPLL.
The Output Clock Synthesizer and Selector (OCSS) block shown in
Figure 3-1 and in more detail in
Figure 7-1contains three output APLLs—T0 APLL, T0 APLL2, and T4 APLL—and their associated DFS engines and output
divider logic plus several additional DFS engines. The APLL DFS blocks perform frequency translation, creating
clocks of other frequencies that are phase/frequency locked to the output clock of the T0 DPLL. The APLLs multiply
the clock rates from the APLL DFS blocks and simultaneously attenuate jitter. Altogether the output blocks of the
DS3106 can produce more than 90 different output frequencies including common SONET/SDH, PDH, and
Synchronous Ethernet rates plus 2kHz and 8kHz frame-sync pulses.
The entire chip is clocked from the external oscillator connected to the REFCLK pin. Thus, the free-run and
holdover stability of the DS3106 is entirely a function of the stability of the external oscillator, the performance of
which can be selected to match the application: typically XO or TCXO. The 12.8MHz clock from the external
oscillator is multiplied by 16 by the Master Clock Generator block to create the 204.8MHz master clock used by the
remainder of the device.
1
The labels T0 and T4 in this document are adapted from output ports of the SETS function specified in ITU-T and ETSI standards such as
ETSI EN 300 462-2-1. Although strictly speaking these names are appropriate only for timing card ICs such as the DS3100 that can serve as
the SETS function, the names have been carried over to the DS3106 so that all of the products in Maxim’s timing IC product line have
consistent nomenclature.