Introduction

Considering that a lot of external stimuli are analog-type stimuli, embedded applications often rely on analog inputs, provided by analog sensors. Most Microchip microcontrollers (MCUs) are equipped with an integrated Analog-to-Digital Converter (ADC) to acquire analog data and be able to process it.

This document describes how to develop an application using the differential conversion feature of the ADC, with the AVR128DA48 Curiosity Nano evaluation kit. It provides an overview of the peripheral, and explains the steps to configure the ADC in Differential mode.

After completing this training, the user will be able to:

• Initialize the system by configuring all peripherals
• Start an ADC conversion
• Continuously read the ADC result and send it through the Universal Synchronous/Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter (USART)
• Run the application step by step to understand the configurations
• Test the developed application using the hardware setup
• Visualize the data using the graphical interface tool

Firstly, an overview of the ADC module will be presented. Then, the proposed application will be described. After establishing an overview, all the steps needed to implement the application will be provided: Getting familiar with the software tools, initializing the system and the peripheral modules, implementing other needed functionalities, debugging the application, and visualizing the received data using the MPLAB Data Visualizer.