FUNCTIONAL DEVICE OPERATION
OPERATIONAL MODES
FUNCTIONAL DEVICE OPERATION
OPERATIONAL MODES
perceivable short flash on the backlight immediately after the
load change.
NORMAL MODE
In normal operation the 34844 is programed via I2C to
drive up to 50mA of current through each one of the LED
channels. The 34844 can be configured in master or slave
mode as set by the M/~S pin.
To avoid this problem, one can simply limit large
instantaneous changes in die temperature by invoking only
small power steps when raising or lowering the display power
at low PWM frequencies. For example, to maintain lock while
transitioning from 0% to 100% duty cycle at 20W load power
and a PWM frequency of 100Hz would entail stepping the
power at a rate not to exceed 1% per 10ms. If a load of less
than 20W is used, then the rate of rise can be increased. As
the locked PWM frequency increases (i.e. use 600Hz instead
of 100Hz), the step rate can be further increased to
approximately 4% per 2ms. The exact step rate to avoid loss
of PLL lock is a function of essentially three things: (a) the
composite thermal resistance of the user's PCB assembly, (b)
the load power, and (c) the PWM frequency. For all cases
below 1KHz, simply using a rate of 1% duty cycle change per
PWM period will be adequate. If this is too slow, the value can
be optimized experimentally once the hardware design is
complete. At PWM rates above 1KHz, it is not necessary to
control the rate of change in PWM duty cycle.
In Master mode, the internal PWM generator frequency is
programmed through the I2C interface. The programmed
value sets the number of 25kHz clocks (40μs) in one PWM
cycle. The 18-bit resolution allows minimum PWM
frequencies of 100Hz to be programmed. The resulting
frequency is output on the CK pin.
In slave mode, the CK pin acts as an input. The internal
digital PLL uses this frequency as the PWM frequency.
By setting one device as a master, and connecting the CK
output to the input on a number of slave configured devices,
all PWM frequencies are synchronized together. For this
application A0/SEN pin indicates which device is enable for
I2C control.
In Slave mode, an internal phase lock loop will lock the
internal PWM generator period to the period of the signal
present at the CK pin. The PLL can lock to any frequency
from 100Hz to 25KHz provided the jitter is below 1000ppm.
At frequencies above 1KHz, the PLL will maintain lock
regardless of the transient power conditions imposed by the
user (i.e. going from 0% duty cycle to 100% at 20W LED
display power). Below 1kHz, thermal time constants on the
die are such that the PLL may momentarily lose lock if the die
temperature changes substantially during a large load power
step. As explained below, this anomaly can be avoided by
controlling the rate of change in PWM duty cycle.
It is important to point out that when operating in the
master mode, one does not need to concern themselves with
loss of lock since the reference clock and the VCO clock are
collocated on the die and therefore experience the same
thermal shift. Hence, in master mode, once lock is initially
acquired, it is not lost and no blanking of the display occurs.
The duty cycle of the PWM in both master and slave mode
is set using a second register on the I2C interface.
An external PWM signal can also be applied in the PWM
pin. This pin is AND’ed with the internal signal, giving the
ability to control the duty cycle either via I2C or externally by
setting any of the 2 signals to 100% duty cycle.
To better understand this issue, consider that the on chip
PLL uses a VCO that is subject to thermal drift on the order
of 1000 ppm/C. Further consider that the thermal time
constant of the chip is on the order of single digit
STROBE MODE
milliseconds. Therefore, if a large power load step is imposed
by the user (i.e. going from 0% duty cycle to 100% duty cycle
with a load power of 20W), the die will experience a large
temperature wave gradient that will propagate across the
chip surface and thereby affect the instantaneous frequency
of the VCO. As long as such changes are within the
bandwidth of the PLL, the PLL will be able to track and
maintain lock. Exceeding this rate of change may cause the
PLL to lose lock and the backlight will momentarily be
blanked until lock is reacquired.
A strobe mode can be programmed via I2C.
In this mode, each rising edge of the PWM signal turns on
the next channel, while turning off all other channels. The
duration that the channel is illuminated is set by the duty cycle
of the PWM input pin.
This mode can be also programmed by controlling the ON
and OFF state of each LED channel via I2C.
MANUAL MODE
At 100Hz lock, the PLL has a bandwidth of approximately
10Hz. This means that temperature changes on the order of
100ms are tolerable without losing lock. But full load power
changes on the order of 10ms (i.e. 100Hz PWM) are not
tracked out and the PLL can momentarily lose lock. If this
happens, as stated above, the LED drivers are momentarily
disabled until lock is reacquired. This will be manifested as a
The 34844 can also be used in Manual mode without using
the I2C interface. By setting the pin M/~S High, the LED
dimming will be controlled by the external PWM signal. The
over-voltage protection limit can be settled by a resistor
divider on A0/SEN pin.
During manual mode, all internal Registers are in Default
Configuration, please refer Table 6, under this configuration
34844
Analog Integrated Circuit Device Data
Freescale Semiconductor
17
