The Stellaris® family of ARM® Cortex™-M3 microcontrollers features up to two hardware quadrature encoders enabling precise positioning sensing. A quadrature encoder input, also known as a 2-channel incremental encoder and most often used in motor control, converts linear displacement into a pulse signal. By monitoring both the number of pulses and the relative phase of the two signals, you can track the position, direction of rotation, and speed of a motor or apparatus. In addition, a third channel, or index signal, can be used to reset the position counter. Each QEI module interprets the code produced by a quadrature encoder wheel to integrate position over time and determine direction of rotation. In addition, it can capture a running estimate of the velocity of the encoder wheel.

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