Frequency Synthesis with Accelerated Locking

A system comprising:

• an oscillating signal source configured to provide a reference signal having a reference frequency;
• compensation means for producing a compensated modulus value to compensate for a difference between a fixed oscillator frequency of a fixed-frequency oscillator signal and the reference frequency of the reference signal based on a modulus value, the compensation means coupled to the oscillating signal source and configured to produce the compensated modulus value such that a relationship between the compensated modulus value and a version of the reference frequency is substantially similar to another relationship between the modulus value and the fixed oscillator frequency;
• and
• frequency generation means for generating an output signal having an output frequency that is based on the reference frequency and the compensated modulus value, the frequency generation means coupled to the oscillating signal source and the compensation means.

A method for frequency synthesis to enable accelerated locking, the method comprising:

• obtaining a reference signal having a reference frequency;
• obtaining a fixed-frequency oscillator signal having a fixed oscillator frequency;
• producing an estimation signal indicative of an estimated frequency based on the reference signal and the fixed-frequency oscillator signal, the estimated frequency representative of an estimate of the reference frequency of the reference signal;
• producing a compensated modulus value, including dividing a modulus value by the estimated frequency;
• providing the compensated modulus value and a version of the reference signal to a frequency generator;
• and
• generating, using the frequency generator, an output signal based on the compensated modulus value and the version of the reference signal.

An apparatus comprising:

• a low-power mode frequency synthesizer including:
• an oscillating signal source configured to provide a reference signal having a reference frequency;
• a frequency divider coupled to the oscillating signal source, the frequency divider configured to produce a version of the reference signal having a version of the reference frequency based on the reference signal;
• a frequency estimator coupled to the oscillating signal source, the frequency estimator configured to produce an estimation signal indicative of an estimated frequency of the reference signal based on the reference signal and a fixed-frequency oscillator signal;
• a compensated modulus calculator coupled to the frequency estimator and configured to compute a compensated modulus value based on a division operation including the estimation signal and a modulus value;
• and
• a frequency generator coupled to the frequency divider and the compensated modulus calculator, the frequency generator configured to generate an output signal having an output frequency that is based on the version of the reference signal and the compensated modulus value.