The 26th annual Applied Power Electronics Conference (APEC) and exposition concluded in Fort Worth, TX last week. In addition to the professional education seminars and technical sessions the exhibition portion of the conference provided a venue for exhibitors to showcase their latest power management and supply solutions, aimed at increasing operating efficiency, reducing standby power and providing a higher level of component integration.
Here’s a few of the new and notable product introductions at APEC:
Analog Devices, (ADI), demonstrated the industry's first digital PFC (power factor correction) controller with AC power meter capability and inrush control functionality. The ADP1047 digital PFC controller uses conventional, continuous-conduction mode PFC techniques; all signals are converted to the digital domain, allowing all parameters to be adjusted and reported over a PMBus compliant interface--including accurate RMS measurement of input voltage, current and power. This allows designers to optimize system harmonic performance, maximize efficiency across the load range and reduce time-to-market.
The ADP1047, programmable via a GUI (graphical user interface), provides typical power metering accuracy of ±3 percent at full load current with further improvements to ±1 percent with customer calibration. Samples and evaluation boards will be available this April and full production is scheduled for July 2011.
At APEC 2011 Fairchild was discussing its mWSaver technology, which offers power savings for power supplies with tfewer components. According to Fairchild mWSaver technology integrates five patented technologies: off time modulation, internal JFET HV start-up, feedback impedance switch, HV discharge, and PSR constant current control; as well as burst mode operation and low operation current techniques.
Fairchild’s product focus at the show was the FAN302HL, a PWM controller for low standby power charger applications. The FAN302HL provides several features to enhance the performance of general flyback converters, including constant-current control and a proprietary topology that enables simplified circuit designs, especially important in battery charger applications. Using the FAN302HL, a charger can be implemented with standby input power consumption of <10mW@230VAC, exceeding ENERGY STAR Program requirements for computers (Version 5.0) efficiency standards.
International Rectifier (IR) unveiled its IR3550, the first in a family of integrated PowIRstage products claimed to deliver higher efficiency and better thermal performance than competing solutions along with smaller footprints, while also simplifying the DC/DC converter design for next-generation high performance servers, storage and communication systems.
The 60A rated IR3550 integrates a synchronous buck gate driver, IR’s latest generation control and synchronous MOSFETs featuring extremely low on-state resistance (RDS(on)) and gate charge, and a Schottky diode into a high density, low profile (6mm x 6mm x 0.9mm) PQFN package. The IR3550 achieves up to a 3 percent improvement in electrical efficiency compared to alternative power stage solutions to help reduce overall power losses and heat generation in the system, thereby reducing dependency on complex thermal management techniques and associated costs as well as improving reliability.
Pricing for the IR3550 begins at US $2.65 each respectively in 10,000-unit quantities.
National Semiconductor introduced the industry’s first full-bridge pulse width modulation (PWM) controllers to integrate all four primary-side bridge MOSFET gate drivers. The LM5045 and LM5045 and LM5046 reduce the number of external power components needed with existing full-bridge solutions and are suitable for delivering higher efficiency and higher power density in quarter-brick and eighth-brick power modules used in a variety of high input voltage communications infrastructure applications.
The LM5045 PWM controller contains all of the features necessary to implement a conventional full-bridge topology power converter using either current mode or voltage mode control. For applications requiring zero-voltage switching (ZVS) to minimize electro-magnetic interference (EMI) due to switching noise, the LM5046 PWM controller contains all the features necessary to implement a phase-shifted full-bridge topology.
National’s new full-bridge PWM controllers are available now and offered in 28-pin LLP and thermally-enhanced TSSOP packages. Priced in quantities of 1,000, the LM5045 is $2.25 and the LM5046 is $2.45.
NXP Semiconductors announced a new generation of GreenChip power solutions, claiming the lowest standby capability in the industry, with levels below 10mW. The NXP GreenChip Switched Mode Power Supply controller ICs are designed for adapters for mobile devices such as cell phone chargers, tablets and notebooks, as well as major home appliances or white goods.
The GreenChip TEA1721 is the first member of the new controller family. It is an AC/DC controller targeting up to 5W power supplies with standby power consumption of less than 10mW. It contains a USB-compliant power supply controller with integrated MOSFET and is compliant to the USB 1.1 and 1.2 charging specification.
The GreenChip TEA1721 is the first member of the new controller family. It is an AC/DC controller targeting up to 5W power supplies with standby power consumption of less than 10mW. It contains a USB-compliant power supply controller with integrated MOSFET and is compliant to the USB 1.1 and 1.2 charging specification.
For medium power levels (applications include PCs, tablets, netbooks and computing peripherals), NXP now offers the GreenChip TEA173x and TEA1703, which are designed for applications that require an efficient and cost-effective power supply solution of up to 75W. The GreenChip TEA173x family of AC/DC flyback controllers enables 90-percent efficient power supplies with less than 100 mW of standby power. By combining the TEA173x and TEA1703, manufacturers can create slim, compact designs and achieve standby power levels of less than 10mW. The ICs combine fixed-frequency operation at high output power with frequency reduction at low output power, resulting in high-efficiency over the total load range.