What are the trends in the development of the DC module power supply market?
In order to meet the market’s increasing demands for power supply performance, DC module power supplies are developing towards high efficiency, high power density, low voltage and high current, low noise, good dynamic characteristics, and wide input range. The circuit topology structure, which is thin, modular, standardized, and can be combined like building blocks, is increasingly being applied. Below is an analysis of its key points.
(1) High Power Density and High Efficiency
Modern communication products have higher and higher requirements for size, which inevitably requires module power supplies to reduce volume and increase power density, while improving efficiency is complementary to this. Current new conversion and packaging technologies can achieve a power density of 188W/in3, more than double that of traditional power supplies, with efficiencies exceeding 90%. The ability to achieve these indicators is attributed to the development of microelectronics technology, which has led to the emergence of a large number of high-performance new devices, thus reducing losses. A typical example is the high-performance Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor Field-Effect Transistor (MOSFET), which replaces the diodes used in traditional designs in synchronous rectifiers, reducing the voltage drop from 0.4V to 0.2V; power MOSFET manufacturers are developing devices with increasingly lower on-resistances, which have decreased from 180mΩ to 18mΩ; the high integration of silicon wafers has reduced the number of components by more than two-thirds, resulting in a compact structure and reduced parasitic inductance and wiring resistance compared to discrete components.
(2) Low Voltage and High Current
With the decrease in the operating voltage of microprocessors, the output voltage of module power supplies has also dropped from the previous 5V to the current 3.3V and even 1.8V. The industry predicts that the output voltage will drop below 1.0V. At the same time, the current required by integrated circuits is increasing, requiring power supplies to provide greater load output capabilities. For a 1V/100A module power supply, the effective load is equivalent to 0.01Ω, and traditional technology finds it difficult to meet such high design requirements. Under a 10mΩ load, every mΩ resistance on the path to the load will cause a 10% drop in efficiency; the resistance of PCB traces, the series resistance of inductors, the on-resistance of MOSFETs, and the wiring of MOSFET chips all affect efficiency. Nanjing Pengtu Power Supply integrates power semiconductors and passive components, which are crucial to the overall layout of the circuit, into a well-functioning basic module, reducing the resistance on the path to the load, thus lowering power consumption and size. The multi-phase design technology, which combines basic modules, will also be gradually promoted. Since the output current of each phase is reduced, smaller power MOSFETs, inductors, and capacitors can be used, simplifying the design. Basic power module packages that have appeared on the market are only 11mm×11mm in size, with a switching frequency of 1MHz. By cascading multiple modules and related components, a working current greater than 100A can be achieved, and compared to other circuits using discrete components, efficiency is improved by 6%, power loss is reduced by 25%, and device size is reduced by about 50%.
(3) Using Software to Design Power Supplies
Nowadays, the variety of DC voltages in communication systems is constantly increasing, and the increase in power density and integration has also increased design difficulty. Traditional manual design and verification can no longer meet the rapidly changing market demands, so power supply auxiliary design software has emerged. These software can guide component selection and provide material lists, circuit simulation, and thermal analysis, shortening the power supply design cycle and improving power supply performance. Auxiliary design software can customize power supplies using various parameters, including input and output voltage ranges, maximum output current, etc., guiding designers in component selection. It contains complete transformer designs, uses various topological methods to synthesize circuits, optimizes them based on cost or efficiency, and outputs component lists.
