Power up your devices

Devices like smart phones, feature phones, tablets, and many other portable devices rely on DC power which is a battery. But how about computers, some monitors, and many other non-portable devices which may need a DC power supply? In order for them to work properly, many parameters need to be weighed. Parameters like power supply, voltage supply, current supply, thermal efficiency, physical design, and many others. Speaking of voltage, current, and power supplies used, they should be in the tolerance level of the device for it to properly work. When it comes to power supplies, MicroPower Direct is but the leading manufacturer. So when you have a system which needs a supply of 600 Watts that has an internal exhaust fan that can be varied, use MPD's MPU-600F series.

MPU-600F series is a single output 600 watt, power factor corrected, AC/DC Power Supply. In this series, a customer can select MPU-600S-12, -14, and -18, 12 V, 14 V, and 18 V respectively. Other output voltage levels can be tailored just for the specific need of a customer, just contact "sales@micropowerdirect.com". So whether, you need it for healthcare, leisure, professional, or other uses, try MicroPower Direct's MPU-600F series. MicroPower Direct, WE POWER YOUR SUCCESS - FOR LESS! Ciao!

Wi-Fi can be on anything

The electronic devices featured above are just some of the examples of devices that can be interconnected with another system through Wi-Fi. These innovations came up to be of help ease life, improve protection, and enhance industrial productivity. On September of 2006, GainSpan was established and started developing innovations, which are more on wireless connectivity products. GainSpan's Wi-Fi modules, i.e. GS1500 and GS1011, can be integrated to several systems which are then used in smart energy, consumer electronics, healthcare and fitness, industrial controls, and many more.

All throughout the years, after hitting local market, GainSpan envisioned to have their products in the global market. On September of 2013, exactly 7 years after its emergence, GainSpan's bosses signed an agreement contract with Digi-key for the global distribution of their products. Anywhere in the world, GainSpan's Wi-Fi modules and other products can now be accessed and procured. Whether you are a student, a hobbyist, enthusiast, geek, or an industry, envisaging for an inter-connectivity thru Wi-Fi, GainSpan should be on top of your priority list. Ciao!

All for a safer road - Part 3

Electronics are virtually everywhere, even in our cars. But the mounted electronics can experience short circuits, earth fault, over-current, or other circuit problem. Also, the use of High-Intensity LED for headlamps is increasing. Which is why, Maxim Integrated designed 3 separate ICs to suit the protection of our mounted electronics.

Using Maxim's MAX16909, modern car electronics, especially the radio units, can achieve more than 83% efficiency. This is because, MAX16909, operates in skip mode for reduced current consumption in light-load applications and supplies internal drive power from the output voltage. With this IC on-board, the car electronic system will be ensured of reliability.

MAX16946 will be responsible in ensuring that any circuit problem, i.e short circuit, will not affect the whole system. This implements a thermal shutdown if, in case, a circuit problem appears.

Lastly, MAX16833 is responsible that LED Headlamps work at constant current. This device also incorporates duty control, which is used for the dimming of the LEDs. It supports 3 control systems, namely, boost, SEPIC, and buck-boost. But when the number of LEDs connected in series is large, with higher drop voltage than the maximum input voltage, only boost can used.

To end, Maxim does not, and will never, design products only for a specific target. Maxim's flexibility gives the company an edge over other companies. INNOVATION DELIVERED! Ciao!

All for a safer road - PART 2

Let's talk again about our protection and safety on the road. Many are saying that for a driver to be assured of his safety, he should be a DEFENSIVE DRIVE. But the fact is, there are many factors to think about when it comes to the safety on the road. One factor can be, the protection devices attached to your cars. Are the brand new cars have the devices that will ensure the safety of its users? How about lane departure warning or lane keeping sensor camera? High beam and spot beam assist, or advanced cruise control? The new MELEXIS MLX75307BA Automotive CMOS Camera can do such things, and still offers some more.

With MLX75307BA chip is on-board our vehicles, there is a higher safety factor that we users can have. Think of it this way, cruising around the boulevard or the highway, or going on a trip with your family, or having a rush to the office, without any thought which are unpleasant. Isn't it great? All for a safer road right? Have the ride of your life, not just with your wheels, but also with the safety features in it. Melexis isn't just producing components for entertainment or for industries, but also for the safety of the general riding public. Ciao!

8-bit mCu with built-in LCD driver

As the development of microcontrollers speeds up, so as its features and sometimes, its limitations. With all these advancements, Lapis semiconductor, under ROHM Semiconductor, designed and produced the 8-bit mCu with LCD Driver. Operates at a low power, only 1 V of flash memory, this device can be used in pedometers, watches, heart rate monitors, thermostats, and other applications that an LCD display is needed.

KEY FEATURES:

 1. Ultra low power

•  Ultra low power, on-chip 1 V operative Flash Memory and Sleep (Halt) current 0.5 µA, popular for battery-driven hand-held type applications and a variegated field.

2. High performance CPU "U8 CORE'

• Original RISC CPU achieved one-instruction one cycle by 3-stage pipelined architecture.

3. LCD Driver + various peripheral functions

• In addition to dot matrix and segment type LCD drivers, RC oscillation type A/D converter ideal for temperature /humidity measurement,  Battery Level Detect, 16bit PWM ideal for backlight dimming, Melody output, etc. are built in

 4. Cost-effective, lightweight, compact debugging emulator

• On-chip Debug Emulator µEASE This compact, cost-saving emulator supports onboard debugging and writing to Flash memory by utilizing on-chip debugging functions when connected to the actual device.

ICs for Dimmable LED Lights

Many of the lighting fixtures nowadays are made of LED bulbs. LEDs are efficient, needs less maintenance, noise-less, environmental friendly, instant on, low energy consumption, and durable. But some of the LED bulbs are not dimmable. Dimmable lighting fixtures are more preferred especially in bedrooms and other places, and have the edge than the non-dimmable ones. So Power Integrations developed a TRIAC-dimmable LED Driver IC, the LYT4322E.

This device helps the circuitry to be a space-saver due to its functions that compensates several components. With its flicker free design, an LED bulb can be dimmed without any flicker effect. The designers of LYT4322E added more feature such as, short circuit, overload, open feedback, and output over voltage protection, for a safer operation and efficient system.

LYT4322E is designed for Tapped-Buck topology. So the next time you buy an LED dimmable bulb or make it for your self, use Power Integration's LYT4322E. Ciao!

Encapsulation for your chips

Are you having some kind of a project related to circuitry? Have you experienced some thermal mismatch, corrosion, or moisture on your ICs before? Now, to reduce the risks of damages and increase the protection of the components, we recommend you to use any of Master Bond's Glob Top Chip-on-Board (COB) Encapsulation solutions.
   
  Master Bond offers 3 types of coating which are One Component Epoxies, Two Component Epoxies, and UV Curing Systems. Either of the three types, you are assured of an economical, space-saving solution offering environmental protection, mechanical support, and thermal dissipation for large chip on board devices.

LSI SandForce

With the long delays for the global marketing of a new Solid State Drive (SSD), LSI, an Avago Technologies Company, introduces SF3700. Then? What's new with this SSD? SandForce 3700 is able to fully utilize the x4 bandwidth and at 1800 MBps100% sequential read operations.

The Avago-LSI-Seagate owners are proud to announce that SF3700 is the industry's first flash controller to fully support the native PCI-e Gen2 and SATA 6 Gb/s host interfaces in a single ASIC design. The SF3700 family used LSI SHIELD advanced error correction to further extend the life span of a flash memory. With LSI RAISE (Redundant Array of Independent Silicon Elements) technology, SF3700 flash controllers are ensured of a superior data protection.Then LSI implements a high level security protocols to ensure the safety of the data stored in the SF3700 in the presence of Dual AE-256.

Last August 6 of this year, at the Santa Clara Convention Center, a group from LSI demonstrated the uses of SF3700. As SandForce products are used in many computer, when SF3700 will be released, this one would make a great impact. See you! Ciao!

Driver for LED Displays

What first pops up on your mind when you want to design a LED display? Is it the LED bulbs? Or the size? Or the design? After which, when you're already set to design the circuitry, which brand of parts do you prioritize? Are those just the cheap once or those that will give you more than enough of what you need? Well, here's what MicroPower Direct offers you, LDF24E-xx series.

It's a miniature SMT, constant current output DC/DC LED driver. It offers a 300 - 700 mA output current and 2.0 MHrs MTBF, and most of all, LOW, LOW COST! Well, this product isn't just all talk, it has an efficiency of an up to 96%. Now, if you want to design your own LED displays, make sure you're using MPD's LDF24E-xx series. Ciao!

Dev kit with PIC32

Students taking up Electrical Engineering, use dev kits almost every day. When designing a Bluetooth system using a dev kit, it is important that you have the features that you need. So here's Microchip's PIC32 BLUETOOTH STARTER KIT, which features a 32-bit microcontroller.

1. PIC32MX270F256D 32-bit mCu (U1).
2. CREE high output multi-color LED with PWM input.
3. USB Type-A connector to support USB host.
4. USB mini-B connector for on-board debugging support.
5. Device Reset push button.
6. Five user-definable push buttons.
7. SPI Serial EEPROM (2 Mb).
8. Daughter board expansion connector (DAC or codec support).
9. Integrated Certified HCI Class 1 Bluetooth radio module.
10. Authentication connector.
11. Integrated 3-axis accelerometer andtemperature sensor.

 

1. PIC24FJ256GB106 USB microcontroller for on-board debugging.
2. USB micro-AB receptacle for USB Host or Device connectivity for PIC32 USB applications.
3. Regulated +3.3V power supply for powering the starter kit through USB or an expansion board.

 

ZMDI Energy Efficiency Challenge of the Month

For more information about ZMDI's Energy Efficiency Challenge of the Month. Click on the link below and see if you're up for the challenge.

ZMDI Energy Efficiency Challenge of the Month

Inverter for everyday use

When planning to have a solar panel system in your household, you should be thinking of powering up your lights and some appliances. But the thing is, do you know what are the things you need? It is easy to find a solar panel, which may vary according to your power rating needs, and the battery, which your power is stored. How about the DC/AC inverter? Do you know which brand gives more efficiency than the others?

Other power inverters are designed to suit your power rating needs, but not the efficiency of it. What's the use of having that if it just wastes power? So a company designed a DC/AC inverter which gives more than 90%. Astrodyne's TS-1500-148F is a true sine wave DC-AC power inverter, capable of producing rated power of up to 1500 W.
 

This inverter has the following features:

• True sine wave output (THD<3%)
• Power ON-OFF switch
• Saving mode setted by controller
• LED panel indication power status
• Thermostatically Controlled Cooling Fan
• Protection: Bat. Low alarm/Bat. Low shutdown/Over temp./Output short/Input polarity reverse/Over load
• Approvals: UL458/FCC/E13/CE .

Being used as an inverter, TS-1500-148F can be used, but not limited to, home appliance, power tools, office and portable equipment, vehicle and yacht. So, the next time you need an inverter, use Astrodyne's TS-1500-148F and you will be satisfied. Ciao!

Tiny over current protector

Before this post, we talked about a low-ohmic current sensing device which was for portable gadgets. Now, we will be talking about a current sensing IC which protects heavy equipments, power tools, and induction heaters. Introducing Mouser's IR25750L Current Sensing IC.

On what applications can IR25750L be used? What are the features of this IC? Well, here are the features and application of IR25750L.

The more power a system needs, the greater chance of over current to occur. So when we use our power tools, heavy equipments, and even our induction heaters, make sure there's an IR25750L Current Sensing IC in it. Better safe than sorry right! Ciao!

Miniaturization of resistors for our gadgets' protection

With the innovations nowadays like, smartphones, HDD/DVD players, and wearable devices, there is a tiny piece of device that does a big job. This tiny device is called low-ohmic chip resistor. With this device on our gadgets, we will be secured from having voltage spikes and over current. ROHM introduces UCR006, a series of ultra-compact, thick-film chip resistors that provides greater energy savings.

With a smaller footprint, UCR006 series, gives the circuit more space. This series provides a resistance for as low as 100 mΩ and a temperature range of -55 to 155 °C in the low-ohmic region.


 


This series has features, such as, an ultra-low ohmic thick-film resistors that contribute to greater energy savings, wide operating temperature range (-55 to 155°C) expands application compatibility, delivers twice the rated power vs. same-sized products, making them ideal replacements, and 3 key characteristics provide superior current detection accuracy.

Now that we know about the device that helps protect our gadgets, let's try to protect them too by taking good care of them. Ciao!

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Low-cost Fixed User FPGA

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Reference Designs for Automotive Infotainment Systems

Optimization of Power Semicons

Let me share you an application note by IXYS. By the way IXYS is a premier power semiconductor manufacturer. They excel in their products such as, ICs, MCUs, RF power, and power devices.

"Achievable current density of low voltage power MOSFET components has increased significantly over the past years. Those devices are mainly used in converters for automotive auxiliary drives or renewable energy. The paper outlines state of the art technology and gives an outlook on further development taking into account the particular requirements of the aforementioned demanding applications." This is taken from the abstract of the paper entitled, "Recent Achievements and Approaches for Further Optimization of High Current Low Voltage Power Semiconductor Components".

 

To further know about this lecture type AppNote of IXYS, kindly click the link below. 

Recent Achievements and Approaches for Further Optimization of High Current Low Voltage Power Semiconductor Components

Deep Memory for Accuracy

Well, I have been trying to ask my colleagues and my former professors on what, for them, is the best characteristic of a digital oscilloscope. To my surprise, they said the same thing, MEMORY DEPTH. Now, a lot of us don't know what this thing is. Admittedly? I don't. As I browse through my books, I learned that memory depth is important, especially in digital storage oscilloscope.

There are so many digital storage oscilloscope for sale in the market. But, who can cater a deeper memory? If you're at school performing tests, at a lab, or at a testing table, you really should have a good oscilloscope.

After you analyze a sample, you will then store it in a memory for future purposes. Then, the more samples you store, the higher the sample rate. But what if your device only has a low memory depth? You won't achieve your goal. If I were you, purchase for yourselves or for your company or school Rigol's large memory depth scopes. These scopes are: RIGOL DS4000 and DS6000