New Industry Products

New CamSemi Controllers Enable Low Standby Consumption for Higher Power Applications

June 30, 2010 by Jeff Shepard

Cambridge Semiconductor Ltd. (CamSemi) announced a new addition to its existing C2160 family of Primary Side Sensing (PSS) controllers enabling manufacturers of higher power embedded and multiple output power supplies to fully exploit the cost benefits of bipolar transistors in developing lower cost and more energy-efficient solutions. The C2163 PSS controller is aimed at universal input adapters and chargers above 8W.

CamSemi says the C2163 delivers ultra-low standby power consumption and high efficiency power supplies for major applications such as networking products and set-top boxes, typically around 16W but is also well suited for tablet computer and power tool chargers and other fast-growing, higher powered sectors. The new controller uses low cost bipolar transistors to very significantly cut power supply system costs but without impacting performance. For example, a 12W adapter based on C2163 delivers an average efficiency greater than 80% and a no-load power consumption of less than 100mW against the current Energy Star 2.0 requirement of 300mW.

"CamSemi’s new C2163 controller is the first of our products targeting higher power universal chargers and builds on the success we are achieving with our other PSS controllers in the mobile phone charger market. All the techniques we developed to cut no-load power consumption to less than 30mW for 5 star-rated chargers have been utilised but at higher powers. C2163 is unique in combining low cost and energy efficiency with greater design and manufacturing flexibility where one controller can be utilised for multiple designs," said David Baillie, CEO of CamSemi.

The C2163 delivers the same key design benefits as the company’s existing PSS controller families including: ’best in class’ voltage and current regulation without board level trimming; easily programmable cable compensation of up to 10%; switching frequency adjustment; and quasi-resonant switching to improve efficiency and reduce EMI. The C2163PX2 part is packaged in SOT23-6 and available in volume now.