5 February 2015

EPC introduces demonstration board as 150W, 8Ω Class-D audio amplifier reference design

Efficient Power Conversion Corp (EPC) of El Segundo, CA, USA, which makes enhancement-mode gallium nitride on silicon (eGaN) power field-effect transistors (FETs) for power management applications, has introduced the EPC9106, a reference design for a 150W, 8Ω Class-D audio amplifier.

The demonstration board uses a bridge-tied-load (BTL) design, composed of four ground-referenced half-bridge output stages, which allows scalability and expandability of the design. All elements that can impact the sonic performance of Class-D Audio systems are minimized or eliminated in an eGaN FET-based system.

"An eGaN FET power stage provides a precise high-power reproduction of the Class-D PWM signal with extremely high linearity," comments Dr Skip Taylor, co-founder & former chief technology officer of Intersil's D2 Audio. "This high linearity reduces the need for large amounts of feedback, ultimately allowing for the best possible audio quality, providing clean, crisp middle and high frequencies and a tight, solid reproduction of the low frequencies."

The EPC9106 features the EPC2016 eGaN FET in conjunction with the LM5113 eGaN FET gate driver from Texas Instruments. The board demonstrates that high-quality sound can be achieved in a small size due to the performance capabilities of high-frequency switching eGaN FETs. With this high efficiency, the EPC9106 design allows for the complete removal of any heat-sink requirement, which also reduces the potential contribution to radiated EMI/EMC emissions and overall system cost, says EPC.

The power block of the EPC9106 including eGaN FETs, driver, inductor and input/output caps is an ultra-compact 2.1mm x 1.6mm layout. Despite its small size, the EPC9106 reference design achieves 96% efficiency at 150W, 8Ω, and 92% efficiency at 250W, 4Ω.

EPC9106 demonstration boards are priced at $1338 each and are available from Digi-Key.

Tags: EPC E-mode GaN FETs

Visit: http://digikey.com/Suppliers/us/Efficient-Power-Conversion.page

Visit: http://epc-co.com/epc/Products/DemoBoards/EPC9106.aspx