ADC bandwidth can be expressed in terms of full-power (FPBW) or small-signal bandwidth, as in the case of an amplifier. This is defined as the input frequency at which the FUNDAMENTAL signal in the FFT output drops 3dB. Therefore, the distortion may be very bad at the FPBW frequency. As shown here, the ENOB specification degrades well before the FPBW, due to increased HF distortion at full power. By reducing the input power the ENOB performance is maintained to a higher frequency. ADC input bandwidth must always be examined in conjunction with ENOB, SNR, and SFDR to see if the bandwidth is really usable.

