An ignition apparatus including a primary and a secondary winding for producing a spark voltage, an ion current detection circuit for producing an ion current signal, a slope detector and a knock detector. In particular, an equalization architecture is described that includes a continuous-time linear equalizer and a decision feedback equalizer, each with offset cancellation that enables the equalizer to be used at high data rates. The attachment region has an electrostatic field generation unit for forming an electrostatic field in order to reflect the metal ions introduced from the metal ion generation region so as to guide them to the mass spectrometry region.