MCA - Multichannel Analyzer

[trastikata]

For the home lab I am planning to add a multichannel analyzer. Since I don't have much experience with it, I was wondering if my approach is correct?

I plan on using a 16-bit PIC with 12-bit ADC and for speed and simplicity I'll store each ADC reading in a 4096 Dword RAM accumulator array. That is to say a 12-bit ADC will have 4096 bins. If for example the ADC reading is 19 then the 19th element in the array is incremented by 1, if the next ADC reading  is 2345 then the 2345th element in the array is incremented by 1. 

Do you think this approach is correct, any suggestions will be much appreciated?

[charliecoutas]

Sounds interesting. I can recommend a 16 bit chip for the job: dsPIC33CK256MP???  At least two of us (Bob and I) are using this and can provide help in getting it sorted. We are both running at 200MHz which gives 100 million instructions per second. This chip also has a 12 bit DAC which is easy to use. I used dsPIC33CK256MP505 because it was all I could get from Farnell (UK)!

Charlie