Analog to Digital Converter

[Douglas Taylor]

I have a number of laboratory instruments that are from the 1990 time 
frame.  They produce digital data that is the digitized signal from a 
detector, the data can be from 512 to 65K samples long.  The ADC used in 
these instruments is a 16bit 100ksample/sec design.  The ADC is in a 3 
by 4 inch metal box with a row of pins on each long edge.

I think some of them are failing because I get the full 16 bit 
resolution from one machine, but not the others.  This was determined by 
taking the digital samples and sorting the values and computing the 
increments between the adjacent values.  In some cases the output looked 
like 14 bit resolution and in one case 6 bit resolution.

Does anyone have any experience with technology?

Who was the manufacturer?  (There is no id on the outside)

What is inside the box?  Is it a hybrid circuit?

Doug