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Can I use an AND gate with a clock input? For example, in the picture below, I have a positive-edge D flip-flop. I'm using an AND gate with the Select_chip input and the Clock input but I'm not sure if this works. When the clock is assigned to a push button, the button will start at high, and then when I press it it will go low to high causing a positive-edge. But with an AND gate, it doesn't seem to work in my mind...

EDIT: I thought about it a little more, let's say Select_chip will be on HIGH always, then if the push button for the Clock starts at high, and if I press the button, the AND gate output will be low since the "Write_enable/Clock" will go low, which inputs into the flip flop changing high to low, and then when the button comes back up, Write_enable is high, making AND gate's output high, therefore changing the flipflop's Clk from low back to high causing a positive edge trigger.

Is my logic correct? I'm not sure.

enter image description here

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  • \$\begingroup\$ what's with the giant wasteland of space in the schematic diagram between the flipflop and output? would make it an easier to read image(would be closer up) if you made things closer \$\endgroup\$ – KyranF Mar 26 '15 at 22:00
  • \$\begingroup\$ Perhaps you want a NAND? But in general, if you have AND gate with 2 inputs, and one is a chip select and the other is a standard clock signal this is how it works: if chip select is HIGH, and clock signal goes HIGH, output = HIGH (rising edge). Clock signal goes LOW, output = LOW (falling edge). The chip select input literally just becomes an ON/OFF switch for the Clock. \$\endgroup\$ – KyranF Mar 26 '15 at 22:02
  • \$\begingroup\$ It's up to you how you want the inputs to go, and deal with logic inversion \$\endgroup\$ – KyranF Mar 26 '15 at 22:03
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    \$\begingroup\$ I hope you have some serious debouncing on your push button! \$\endgroup\$ – KyranF Mar 26 '15 at 22:04
  • \$\begingroup\$ I thought about it again, but it seems it might not work... This is suppose to be a SRAM cell for a 16x16 SRAM, the Select_chip input is from the output of a decoder that chooses which of the 16 SRAM to store the inputs in. So Select_chip is not always on. \$\endgroup\$ – page4 Mar 26 '15 at 22:08
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The naming scheme on the primitives in your image suggests that this design is intended to be implemented in an FPGA.

If this is the case, gating a clock network is not recommended. Clocked logic elements in an FPGA can usually only be clocked by dedicated clock networks. These networks are only available in very limited numbers (i.e, perhaps a dozen on the entire chip!). Instantiating logic which passes a signal from combinational logic to a clock will typically result in one of these networks being used for that signal, making it unavailable for other logic on the chip.

To avoid this, most FPGAs will make logic primitives available with separate combinational logic "enable" signals. (Xilinx calls theirs FDCE/FDPE/FDRE/FDSE depending on the state at reset, and Altera calls theirs DFFE.) These logic elements will (more or less) AND the clock signal with the combinational enable signal, giving the same result as your schematic here without the detrimental effects on clock networks.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ Ahhh!! I'm so stupid! This is exactly it! Thank you so much!! I'm using Quartus(Altera) and indeed there is a DFFE. I completely forgot you can put an enable input into a flip-flop. \$\endgroup\$ – page4 Mar 26 '15 at 22:26

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