What are dB,

Noise Floor
& Dynamic
Range?
by James Wren
Application Engineer, Prosig Ltd

& Don Davies

Technical Director, Prosig Ltd

M
ost engineers are probably
familiar with or have come
across the decibel or dB as
a unit of measurement. Its most
common use is in the field of acoustics
where it is used to quantify sound
levels. However, will be explained
in this article, it is also useful for
a wide variety of measurements in
other fields such as electronics and
communications.
One particular use of dB is to quantify the dynamic range and
accuracy of an analogue to digital conversion system. This applies
to Prosig’s P8000 range of data acquisition hardware where the
noise floor, dynamic range and resolution are all specified in terms
of dB.

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What Are dB, Noise Floor & Dynamic Range?

Decibel (dB) For sound pressure levels, the reference level is usually
chosen as 20 micro-pascals (20 μPa), or 2x10-5 Pa.
The decibel is a logarithmic unit of measurement This is about the limit of sensitivity of the human ear.
that expresses the magnitude of a physical quantity
relative to a reference level. Since it expresses a Note that since the most common usage of the
ratio of two quantities having the same units, it is a decibel unit is for sound pressure level measurements
dimensionless unit. it is often abbreviated to just dB rather than the full
dB(SPL).
Definition
The common decibel units used in acoustics are:
A decibel is used for the measurement of power or
intensity. The mathematical definition is the ratio (L) dB(SPL) Sound Pressure Level. Measurements
of a power value (P1) to a reference power level (P0) relative to 2x10-5 Pa.
and in decibels is given by:
dB(SIL) Sound Intensity Level. Measurements
Ldb= 10Log10( P1/P0) relative to 10-12 W/m2 which is
approximately the level of human
When considering amplitude levels, the power is hearing in air.
usually estimated to be proportional to the square of dB(SWL) dB Sound Power level. Measurements
the amplitude and so the following can be used: relative to 10-12 W.
Ldb= 10Log10( A12/A02) or The human ear does not respond equally to all
Ldb= 20Log10( A1/A0) frequencies (it is more sensitive to sounds in the
frequency range from 1 kHz to 4 kHz than it is to
Since the decibel is a logarithmic quantity it is especially low or high frequency sounds). For this reason sound
good at representing values that range from very measurements often have a weighting filter applied to
small to very large numbers. The logarithmic scale them whose frequency response approximates that of
approximately matches the human perception of both the human ear (A-weighting). A number of filters exist
sound and light. for different measurements and applications, these are
given the names A,B,C and D weighting. The resultant
Like all logarithmic quantities it is possible to multiply measurements are expressed, for example, as dBA or
or divide dB values by simple addition or subtraction. dB(A) to indicate that they have been weighted.
Decibel measurements are always relative to given In electronics and telecommunication, the
reference levels and can therefore be treated as decibel is often used to express power or amplitude
absolute measurements. That is, if a particular ratios in order to quantify the gains or losses of
reference value is known then the exact measurement individual circuits or components. One advantage of
value can be recovered from one of the equations the decibel for these types of measurements is that,
shown above. due to its logarithmic characteristic, the total gain in
dB of a circuit is simply the summation of each of the
The dB unit is often qualified by a suffix which
individual gain stages in dB.
indicates the reference quantity used, some examples
are provided in the following section. In electronics the decibel can also be combined with
a suffix to indicate the reference level used. For
Applications example, dBm indicates power measurement relative
The decibel is commonly used in acoustics to quantify to 1 milliwatt. The following are some common decibel
sound levels relative to a reference. This may be to units used in electronics and telecommunications.
compare two sound sources or to quantify the sound
level perceived by the human ear. The decibel is dBm Power measurements relative to
particularly useful for acoustic measurements since 1mW
for humans the ratio of the loudest sound pressure dBW Power measurements relative to 1W.
level to the quietest level that can be detected is Note that LdBm = LdBW + 30
of the order of 1 million. Furthermore, since sound dBk Power measurements relative to 1kW.
power is proportional to the pressure squared then Note that LdBm = LdBk + 60
this ratio is approximately 1 trillion.

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What Are dB, Noise Floor & Dynamic Range?

dBV Voltage measurement relative to 1V – Noise floor

regardless of impedance.
Any practical measurement will be subject to some
dBu or dBv Voltage relative to 0.775V and is form of noise or unwanted signal. In acoustics this
derived from a 600 Ohm dissipating may be background noise or in electronics there are
0dBm (1mW). often things like thermal noise, radiated noise or
dBμ Electric field strength relative to 1μV any other interfering signals. In a data acquisition
per meter. measurement system the system itself will actually
add noise to the signals it is measuring. The general
dBJ Energy relative to 1 joule. Used for
rule of thumb is: the more electronics in the system
spectral densities where 1 Joule = 1
the more noise imposed by the system.
W/Hz
In data acquisition and signal processing the noise
Examples floor is a measure of the summation of all the noise
If the numerical value of the reference is undefined sources and unwanted signals generated within the
then the decibel may be used as a simple measure of entire data acquisition and signal processing system.
relative amplitudes. As an example, assume there are The noise floor limits the smallest measurement
two loudspeakers, one emitting a sound with a power that can be taken with certainty since any measured
P1 and a second one emitting the same sound at a amplitude cannot on average be less than the noise
higher power P2. Assuming all other conditions are floor.
the same then the difference in decibels between the
In summary, the noise floor is the level of background
two sounds is given by:
noise in a signal, or the level of noise introduced
10 log (P2/P1) by the system, below which the signal that’s being
captured cannot be isolated from the noise.
If the second speaker produces twice as much power
than the first, the difference in dB is

10 log (P2/P1) = 10 log 2 = 3 dB.

If the second had 10 times the power of the first, the

difference in dB would be

10 log (P2/P1)= 10 log 10 = 10 dB.

If the second had a million times the power of the

first, the difference in dB would be

10 log (P2/P1) = 10 log 1000000 = 60 dB.

Note that if both speakers produce the same power

then the difference in dB would be

10 log (P2/P1) = 10 log 1 = 0 dB. Figure 1.

This illustrates some common features of the dB scale As shown in Figure 1 the noise floor is better than
irrespective of the measurement type: -120 dB.
• A doubling of power is represented approximately Figure 2 shows that only signals above the noise floor
by 3dB and a doubling of amplitude by 6dB. can be measured with any degree of certainty. In
this case the signal level of -100dB at 20KHz could
• A halving of power is given by -3dB and a halving be measured. If however, the noise floor increased
of amplitude by -6dB above the -120dB level then it would become more
• 0dB means that the measured value is the same difficult to measure this signal.
as the reference. Note that this does not mean For example, it is possible for the human ear to hear
there is no power or signal. a very low sound such as a pin drop or a whisper.

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4
What Are dB, Noise Floor & Dynamic Range?

However, this is only possible if the noise floor or 20 / 65536 = 0.3 mV

background noise of the particular environment is
very low such as in a soundproof or quiet room. It In decibels this dynamic range is therefore expressed
would not possible to hear or discriminate such low as:
levels in a noisy room.
20 Log10 (1 / 65536) = 96dB

Therefore for a 16-bit ADC the dynamic range is 96dB.

Using the same calculations the dynamic range of a
24-bit ADC is 144dB.

The noise floor of a measurement system is also limited

by the resolution of the ADC system. For example, the
noise floor of a 16-bit measurement system can never
be better than -96dB and for a 24-bit system the
lower limit is limited to -144 dB. In practice, however,
the noise floor will always be higher than this due to
electronic noise within the measurement system.

Modern data acquisition systems, such as the Prosig

P8000, employ a number of sophisticated digital
signal processing techniques to improve the amplitude
resolution and thereby allow low amplitude data, such
Figure 2
as noise floor signals, to be measured with greater
Various techniques are employed by the Prosig P8000 precision and with greater accuracy.
data acquisition system in order to ensure that the
noise floor of the equipment is kept as low as possible.
These include signal-processing functions as well as James Wren
practical features such as the ability to disable cooling James Wren is an Application Engineer
fans during acquisition scans. for Prosig Limited. James graduated
from Portsmouth University in 2001,
Dynamic range and resolution with a Masters degree in Electronic
Engineering. He is a member of the
Dynamic range is a term used to describe the ratio Institute of Electronic Engineers. He has
been involved with motorsport from a very
between the smallest and largest signals that can be early age with special interest in data
measured by a system. acquisition. James is a founder member of the Dalmeny
Racing team.
The dynamic range of a data acquisition system is
defined as the ratio between the minimum and
maximum amplitudes that a data acquisition system Don Davies
can capture. Don Davies graduated from Southampton’s
Institute of Sound and Vibration Research in
In practice most Analogue to Digital Converters 1979 and is now a director of Prosig Ltd. Don
(ADC) have a voltage range of ± 10V. Sometimes has many years experience in developing
software specifically in the areas of signal
amplification may be applied to signals before they
processing and data acquisition. More
are input to an ADC in order to maximize the input recently he has specialised in the capture
voltages within the available ADC range. and analysis of vibration data from rotating machines
such as power station turbine generators, leading to the
The resolution of a measurement system is determined development of Prosig’s PROTOR product. Don is the
by the number of bits that the ADC uses to digitise an Product Manager for the PROTOR system. Prosig have
installed PROTOR systems at more than 30 Power
input signal. Most ADCs have either 16-bit or 24-bit Stations world-wide, continuously monitoring over 150
resolution. For a 16-bit device the total voltage range individual items of plant. Don is a member of the British
is represented by 216 (65536) discrete digital values. Computer Society.
Therefore the absolute minimum level that a system
can measure is represented by 1 bit or 1/65536th of
the ADC voltage range. For a system with a voltage
range of ±10V then the smallest voltage that the
system can distinguish will be:

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