Power System Management

Power System Management (PSM) devices add digital PMBus/SMBus/I2C-interface based control, telemetry and black-box fault recording to analog DC/DC power converters, providing the following high level capabilities to your power system:

  • Software management of power supplies
  • Digital monitoring and data-logging of voltage, current, power and temperature
  • Trimming, margining, sequencing, supervision, fault-logging/management of multiple point-of-load supplies
  • On-the-fly adjustment of configuration parameters
  • Remote supervision and command of power system
PSM

Why Use PSM?

System Level Benefits

  • Energy Consumption: Monitor and predict energy use vs system load/traffic. Optimize performance vs energy consumed with power domains, load shedding and tweaking supply voltages.
  • Reliability: Improve board reliability by precise control of power supplies over time and temperature, continuous monitoring and correlating board failure to EEPROM fault logs (black-box recorder).
  • Predict Failures: Avoid failures by monitoring board health in real-time to predict board aging and replacement.
  • Maintenance: Provide power system field upgrades via firmware, and control power system remotely.

Design Level Benefits

  • PSM brings the software model of rapid prototyping and tweaking to hardware.
  • Easily trim, margin, sequence, supervise, fault-log/manage and monitor multiple rails with one product.
  • Margin boards to improve reliability, increase yield and test FPGA timing.
  • Improve time-to-market by avoiding costly board re-spins.
  • Get complete access to board level diagnostics.
  • Replace discrete circuitry with space-saving integrated solution.

Benefits of PSM

Power System Management products offer cutting edge features such as:

  • A complete, ready-to-use solution architected by power supply experts, using the industry standard PMBus digital interface.
  • Trim, margin and monitor supply outputs to ±0.25% accuracy, guaranteed over temperature.
  • Breadth of products for a comprehensive portfolio (more information under PSM Product Types):
  • LTpowerPlay GUI: Engineering level development environment with remote debug capability and integrated help. Eliminates code development.
  • PMBus compliant commands over I2C/SMBus digital interface.
  • Autonomous Operation: No software coding required.
  • Coordinated sequencing and fault management across devices.

Getting Started

  1. Obtain the PSM Starter Kit DC1962C-KIT.
  2. Download LTpowerPlay.
  3. Watch this video to get started
PSM Getting Started

PSM Product Types

There are two PSM product types:

  • Power System Managers: These devices manage any adjustable point-of-load (POL) supply with enable and trim capability, be it a switching regulator or a linear regulator (LDO). Keep your existing power system while adding capabilities such as trimming (to ±0.25% accuracy), margining, sequencing, fault logging and telemetry (reading VIN, VOUT, IOUT, temperature, faults).
  • DC/DC Converters with Power System Management: These ICs or µModule devices feature a fast analog loop for DC/DC conversion with digital telemetry and control. Programmable parameters include VOUT, ILIM, OV/UV levels, frequency, ramp rate, sequencing time delays and margining. Readable parameters include VIN, IIN, VOUT, IOUT, POUT, duty cycle, temperature and faults.