Microchip Technology dsPIC ‘GS’ digital signal controller for digital power and lighting

The dsPIC33 ‘GS’ digital signal controller (DSC) family has expanded Microchip Technology Inc’s dsPIC DSC portfolio and adds lower-cost options for digital-power conversion. The family of DSCs also offers reduced power consumption, higher efficiency in AC-DC and DC-DC power supplies, HID and LED lighting, solar inverters and other power-conversion applications.

The five-member dsPIC33 family is optimised for digital-power applications via integrated high-speed ADCs, a zero-wait-state signal processing core and flexible high-resolution PWMs. These peripherals are integrated for streamlined interoperation, enabling sub-microsecond digital control loops. 

Key features of this family include on-chip analog comparators with programmable hysteresis and rail-to-rail operation, and an on-chip PMBus address selection current source to reduce external components. The DSCs offer the lowest power dissipation of any of the GS family members, and are the first available in a 20-pin SSOP package and the even smaller 36-pin VTLA package, which has a 5 x 5 mm footprint.

To complement the dsPIC33, the MPLAB starter kit for digital power allows users to explore digital power conversion using Microchip’s dsPIC33 GS architecture in popular digital power-conversion topologies. The kit includes a buck converter and a boost converter with onboard programmable loads for each, along with an LCD for voltage, current, temperature and fault conditions. An onboard debugger/programmer with a USB interface is included.