What is the difference between analog and digital acquisition?

There are a couple of differences between analog and digital acquisition:

• Analog acquisition in modern detectors is realized by the following chain: analog detector unit, detector A/D converter, detector processing unit, detector D/A converter, analog cable, Clarity A/D converter (Colibrick, U-PAD2, INT9, etc.).
• The digital acquisition chain is much simpler: analog detector unit, detector A/D converter, detector processing unit, digital cable (USB, RS232, etc.), Clarity Control Module.

You can see at least three sources of problem in analog way:

• Detector D/A converter
• Analog cable
• Clarity A/D converter (Colibrick, U-PAD2, INT9, etc.)

So there might be a significant difference between analog and digital signal quality. It depends on factors like:

• Quality of detector D/A converter (analog output resolution may be worse than digital).
• Length and quality of analog cable.
• Proper cable connection (symmetrical, non-symmetrical).
• The absolute level of the analog signal (lower signal is more influenced by interferences from other laboratory devices).
• Proper A/D converted voltage range set (most typical problem is that a detector maximum signal is 10-100 mV only and Colibrick voltage range is set to 10 V. This leads to decrease of the voltage step resolution by 100-1000x!).
• Proper sample rate frequency set at all three converters, see FAQ How to set proper Sampling Rate?
• Proper peak width parameter.