19
MAX19794
10MHz to 500MHz Dual Analog Voltage Variable 
Attenuator with On-Chip 10-Bit SPI-Controlled DAC
is enabled and a voltage is also applied to CTRL (pin 
11). The on-chip switches are set to compare the DAC 
voltage to the CTRL voltage at the comparator input, and 
the output of the comparator COMP_OUT trips from high 
to low when the CTRL exceeds the on-chip DAC voltage.
DAC Test Mode
In Table 1 state (1, 1), the attenuators are controlled by 
the on chip 10-bit DAC register. See Register MODE UP/
DWN  Operation  section.  In  this  condition,  the  DAC  is 
enabled and the DAC voltage appears at the CTRL pin. 
In this condition, no signal can be applied to the CTRL 
pin and the load on the CTRL pin should be > 100kI. 
This mode is used only in production testing of the DAC 
voltage and is not recommended for customer use.
Register MODE UP/DWN Operation
The device uses four 13-bit registers for the operation of 
the device. The first bit is the read/write bit,the following 
two  are  address  bits,  while  the  remaining  10  are  the 
desired data bits. The read/write bit determines whether 
the register is being written to or read from. The next two 
address bits select the desired register to write or read 
from. These address bits can be seen in Table 2. Table 3 
describes the contents of the four registers.
Figure 1 shows the configuration of the internal registers 
of  the  device,  and  Figure  2  shows  the  timing  of  the 
SPI bus. Register 0 is used to set the DAC code to the 
desired value, register 1 selects the step-up code, and 
register 2 selects the step-down code.
The part also contains a MODE control pin (Table 4), 
along with UP and DWN controls(Table 5). When MODE 
is 0, the contents of register 0 get loaded into the 10-bit 
DAC register and set the value of the on-chip DAC. In this 
condition, the UP and DWN control pins have no effect on 
the part. In MODE 1, the effective DAC code fed to the 
10-bit DAC register is equal to:
m x Register 1 - n x Register 2
where m and n are the number of UP and DWN control 
steps accumulated, respectively.
After powering up the part, UP and DWN should both 
be set to 0 to reset the m and n counters to be 0. This 
results in a 10-bit all 0 code out of the mathematical block 
in Figure 1. This is applied to the 10-bit DAC register that 
drives the DAC. To increase (decrease) the code using 
the UP (DWN) pin, the DWN (UP) pin must be high and 
the UP (DWN) pin should be pulsed low to high. The part 
is designed to produce no wraparounds when using UP 
and DWN stepping, so the DAC code maxes out at 1023 
or goes no lower than 0. See Figure 3 for the UP and 
DWN control operation.
Switching back to MODE 0 produces the same 10-bit DAC 
code as was previously loaded into register 0. Switching 
back to MODE = 1 results in the previous 10-bit DAC code 
from the register 1 and 2 combiner/multiplier block.
Register 3 is used to set the RDBK_EN register in the 
write  mode  and  is  used  to  read  back  the  RDBK_EN 
register and COMP_OUT in the read mode.
SPI Interface
The device can be controlled with a 4-wire SPI-compatible 
serial interface. Figure 2 shows a timing diagram for the 
interface. In the write mode, a 13-bit word is loaded into 
the device through the DIN pin with CS set low. The first 
bit of the word in the write mode is 0, and the next two 
bits select the register to be written to. See Table 2. The 
next 10 bits contain the data to be written to the selected 
register. After the 13 bits are shifted in, a low to high CS 
command is applied and this latches the 10 bits into the 
selected register. The entire write command is ignored 
if CS is pulsed low to high before the last data bit is 
successfully captured.
For the read cycle, the first bit clocked in is a 1 and this 
establishes that a register is to be read. The next two 
clocked bits form the address of the register to be read.
See Table 2. In this read mode, data starts to get clocked 
out of the DOUT pin after A0 is captured. The DOUT 
pin goes to a high-impedance state after the 10 bits are 
transmitted, or if CS goes high at any point in time during 
the transmission.
Voltage Reference
The  device  has  an  on-chip  voltage  reference  for  the 
DAC and also has a provision to operate with an off-
chip reference. Table 6 provides details in selecting the 
desired reference.