1. A pipelined analog-to-digital converter, comprising: a plurality of comparing means, wherein said comparing means comprise: a) a hierarchical tree structure, wherein said hierarchical tree structure comprises a plurality of hierarchical levels; and b) tuneable thresholds, wherein said tuneable thresholds are configured to be settable; and a plurality of amplifying circuits; wherein said comparing means are configured to compare an input signal and at least two of said tuneable thresholds, wherein at least one of said hierarchical levels is associated with at least one amplifying circuit from said plurality of amplifying circuits, wherein said at least one amplifying circuit is configured to generate said input signal of at least one comparing means at a next hierarchical level, wherein said plurality of hierarchical levels comprises a means for setting said tuneable thresholds based on an output of a previous hierarchical level in an effort to remove nonlinear distortion of said previous hierarchical level.