On 17/09/06, graywolf <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > So you are saying a 22 bit ADC is overkill. Wonder if Pentax knows that? > BTW, Rob's explanation was clearer, but still not documented for my > curiosity.
A theoretically perfect 22 bit ADC should be able to resolve 4,194,304 voltage levels between zero and it the voltage represented by all bits at 1. This is clearly overkill given the noise figures of the source device, if the ADC was 18 bits I'm sure you'd be seeing far less discussion regarding the validity of sampling at such high resolution. I'll try to dredge up some decent links on the subject. Personally I'm sure that the mention of 22 bits is true but purely marketing hype. In in the case of the K10D it's great marketing fodder, regardless of the fact that it's overkill or not. The chip that they've likely used is is marketed as a generic imaging system building block which when coupled with an appropriate sensor (and cooling system) may be entirely justifiable. Let's just hope that in the case of the K10D the pre-processing stages following the ADC live up to the hype and deliver a very usable 12 bit RAW image file. -- Rob Studdert HURSTVILLE AUSTRALIA Tel +61-2-9554-4110 UTC(GMT) +10 Hours [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://home.swiftdsl.com.au/~distudio//publications/ Pentax user since 1986, PDMLer since 1998 -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
