I have an existing design that uses a single op amp stage with differential inputs and AC coupling caps on the inputs. The circuit acts as a 5:1 divi der so the two input resistors are 51 kohms and the feedback resistor as we ll as the ground resistor in the non-inverting input leg are 10 kohms. The input caps are sized to maintain a good low frequency response.
Many years ago I recall going through the equations for such an amplifier d esign to understand why the voltage divider was required to get equal gain on the two input legs. I guess I never really looked at the unbalanced inp ut impedances. In the circuit above the difference in impedance is not lar ge on the two legs. One is 51 kohms and the other is 61 kohms. The input filter calculations were done with 51 kohms, so the imbalance never showed up.
Now a customer is asking for these resistors to be changed to give a voltag e gain of 1 rather than 1/5. This will give an imbalance in input impedanc e of 2:1. Still, this should not be a problem as long as the minimum frequ ency response is met. I just never realized a differential op amp circuit had this issue.
This circuit depends on a low pass filter to perform anti-aliasing. But th at is elsewhere in the design and is not impacted by this issue. However, if there were a cap across the feedback resistor for this low pass filter, the filtering would also be unbalanced. Am I correct in thinking to mainta in a balanced frequency response for a low pass filter in a differential op amp circuit would require a similar capacitor in the ground leg of the non
-inverting input to have equal cutoff frequencies on the two inputs?
I can't find much info on this on the web, so I guessing this is messy enou gh that it is not done very often. Unfortunately there just isn't enough s pace available to make a more complex circuit. It worked pretty well with the larger input resistors. With smaller input resistors the compromises s tart to be a bigger problem.