High-speed and low resolution analog-to-digital converters (ADC) are key elements in

the read channel of optical and magnetic data storage systems. The required resolution is about 6-7 bits while the sampling rate and effective resolution bandwidth requirements with each generation of storage system. Folding is a technique to reduce the increase number of comparators used in the flash architecture. By means of an analog preprocessing circuit in folding A/D converters the number of comparators can be reduced significantly. Folding architectures exhibit low power and low latency as well as the ability to run at high sampling rates. Folding ADCs employing interpolation schemes to generate extra folding waveforms are called “Folding and Interpolating ADC” (F&I ADC).