In the simple slit-image approximation, the projected slit width is . Equating this width to the separation of barely resolved features, using the grating dispersion, gives
This recovers the stated spectral resolving power under the assumption that the grating has unit anamorphic magnification.
For arbitrary distinct and , the anamorphic magnification of a grating must be included. At fixed wavelength, the grating equation gives , so the slit image instead has width . Thus the general slit-limited resolving power of a grating is
The two expressions agree in the Littrow configuration, . Without that condition or the unit-magnification approximation, the quoted expression is not the general slit-limited result. Finite grating size, detector sampling, and optical aberrations can lower the actual resolution further.
Let be the central camera direction. The grating equation fixes
The usual adjacent-order free spectral range of an echelle grating is therefore
The constant has dimensions of length and is the path difference between adjacent grooves for light directed along the camera axis; it is also the fixed product . Near the Littrow configuration, . The detector width corresponding to this interval is approximately , with grating dispersion .
There is a convention issue in reading the question literally. Adjacent order-center separation is exactly the expression above. A partition assigning each wavelength to whichever order lands closest to the vertical axis has boundaries halfway in detector displacement, not at adjacent order centers. In the small-angle detector approximation its boundaries for order are and , giving width . Both conventions give for high orders, but their exact finite- widths differ. The quoted expression is the conventional adjacent-order spacing.
A slit of width at the focus of a collimator subtends . Its projected width is . Dividing this width by the grating dispersion gives . Thus the spectral resolving power is . Omitting the anamorphic factor gives a denominator instead; these agree in the Littrow configuration.