ON Semiconductor Unveils 10 A Supercapacitor-Based LED Flash Driver

ON Semiconductor, global supplier of high performance, energy efficient, silicon solutions has reportedly unveiled new NCP5680 supercapacitor-optimized LED flash driver, designed to deliver up to 10 amperes (A) for photo flash and video light in ultra-slim camera phones and compact digital cameras.

 

Elaborating on the features of the new NCP5680, Marie-Therese Capron, ON Semiconductor director said that, the new product can be combined with an ultra-thin prismatic supercapacitor, to achieve an ideal LED flash and power management solution for slim camera phones and digital cameras.

 

This total LED flash solution supplies comparable light energy to xenon flash, but with only half of the comparable solution height, and requires no extra LED for video capture.

 

The NCP5680 enables the Lithium-ion battery to support more power-hungry functions for a longer time and its new supercapacitor-based power management solution enables smart phones to offer ever richer functionality, according to the company sources.

 

Also, the integrated driver in the NCP5680 solution enables the supercapacitor to handle other peak-power needs such as zoom, auto-focus, audio, video, wireless transmissions, GPS readings and RF amplification, which extends battery life without compromising the slimline design.

 

Photographer and designers can utilise this new solution, which offers programmable control of charging and discharging of the supercapacitor and unique overload protection for right amount of light for high-quality photography.

 

The integrated driver can also power other high-peak-current circuits in portable systems, such as audio amplifiers, extending the useful battery operating time, says the company.

 

NCP5680 comes with I²C registers that adjusts the output current and flash duration of each of the two LEDs in real time, supporting different lighting effects, such as indicator light, pre-flash, and power flashlight for photographing and torchlight for video recording.

 

Additionally, the NCP5680 has multiple built-in protection mechanisms, including flash time out, temperature detection, overload protection and short circuit protection. The device protects the flash circuitry from any faulty conditions of the driving circuit, as well as for the LED.

 

The company is currently offering the new NCP5680 in 3.5 mm x 3.5 mm x 0.55 mm µQFN-24 (micro-QFN-24) package, priced at $1.10 per unit in 3,000 unit quantities.