What is called a stage?

How to say a logic circuit is single stage or multi stage?

(IMHO:In My Humble Opinion)

The words "multi-stage" are used by people who are not sure how many stages an analog amplifier has, or by the advertising agency people who have been given very precise spec and instructions to make it sell like hotcakes; "multi-stage amp" sounds more impressive than "3 stage" let alone "2 stage" to your average Joe.

I haven't a certificate in Electronics (went and got a cert IV in IT(net/inet) for some daft reason) but I have worked in the industry for a fair while now and I've quite some impression that we are much more inclined to describe digital circuits as having processes and analog circuits as having stages - each pluralised pending how complex a circuit is because I've seen single process digital PCBs and I've seen single stage analog PCBs too.

I am probably right (I usually write the word 'wrong' there) but I can handle learning some actual facts instead of having to go by what I've beaten out of (ticketed) Engineers and Technicians in my time if I am wrong (again! lol)

One thing I've always loved about forums is that if I am that wrong then someone who knows better is likely to see and few can resist the urge to correct me

I would suggest that if you have a single gate then you have one stage. If you connect the output of that gate to the input of another you have two stages. If you have multiple gates in parallel, i.e. The output of one does not drive the input of another then it is still only one stage.

I am not sure how useful the term is in digital logic although for combinatorial logic you have the risk of glitches and race conditions the more 'stages' you go through.

Keith

I wish Keith had beaten me to the punch because his suggestion reads true enough for me to think my previous answer is rubbish full of beer and vinegar and I apologise.

I found Keith's post helpful

I don't think it is a case of right or wrong. There is no context given for the original questions so it is a case of guessing what the original poster was asking. Depending on the context I may be way off the mark (and I am an analogue designer anyway, not digital).

Keith