Notes on Digital Signal Processing: Practical Recipes for Design, Analysis and Implementation

Note 2. Overview of Sampling Techniques

This note discusses the difference between implicit and explicit sampling. It introduces three different mathematical models of explicit sampling techniques—ideal sampling, natural sampling, and instantaneous sampling.

Digitization of an analog signal is the one process above all others that makes DSP such a useful technology. If it were limited to working with only those signals that orginate in digital form, DSP would be just an academic curiosity. Digitization actually comprises two distinct operations: sampling and quantization, which are usually analyzed separately.

2.1. Implicit Sampling Techniques

In implicit sampling, a sample measurement is triggered by the signal attaining some specified value ...