The part is well-suited for half- and full-duplex applications. The digital interface is extremely flexible, allowing simple interfacing to digital back ends that support half- or full-duplex data transfers, often allowing the AD9868 to replace discrete ADC and DAC solutions. Power-saving modes include the ability to reduce power consumption of individual functional blocks or power down unused blocks in half-duplex applications. A serial port interface (SPI) allows software programming of the various functional blocks. An on-chip PLL clock multiplier and synthesizer provide all the required internal clocks, as well as two external clocks, from a single crystal or clock source.