acquisitionZONE Products for the week of November 1, 2004
Intersil Corporation, a world leader in the design and manufacture of high performance analog solutions, introduced the world's fastest triple amplifier and the first one to break the 1 GHz amplifier barrier. With a total supply current of just 25 mA and the ability to run from a single supply voltage from 5 V to 12 V, the EL5367 offers very high performance for extremely little power consumption. The new EL5367 drives resolutions greater than QXGA (2048 pixel x 1536 pixel video graphics standard) at Gain of 2 for very high-speed video and monitor applications.
"This performance leading triple amplifier is a direct response to our customers' requests for more performance with lower power," said Sameer Vuyyuru, Intersil's director of marketing for High Speed Analog Products. " As our display partners strive towards ever greater resolutions, they can rely on Intersil to provide the silicon solutions they need."
The EL5367 is a current-feedback operational amplifier that offers a
wide -3dB bandwidth of 1GHz and a low supply current of 8.5mA per amplifier.
The EL5367 works with supply voltages ranging from a single 5V to 12V and
it is also capable of swinging to within 1 V of either supply on the output.
Because of their current-feedback topology, the EL5367 does not have the
normal gain-bandwidth product associated with voltage-feedback operational
amplifiers. This device is ideal for driving high-resolution video. With
a gain of 2 bandwidth of 800 MHz on all three channels this device will
drive a double terminated 75 ohm cable easily.
analogZONE Says . . .
Intersil continues to push the op amp envelope and it is rather delightful to see the Elantec brand getting deeply back into its video origins. There have been so many of these op amps reviewed here the list is too long to recite -- but go to the Product Archive under Intersil to have a look, including the Product of the Year winning EL5166/67 amplifiers.
The EL5367 is another current-feedback amplifier, exhibiting only a small reduction in bandwidth with increasing gain. At a useful gain of 2 the typical small-signal bandwidth is 800 MHz with a slew of 6000 V/µs (both with split 5-V rails). The 0.1-dB gain flatness is a typical 100 MHz at the same gain of 2, making the part perfectly usable for broadcast studio HD work as well as consumer QXGA (225 MHz) display applications. The large-signal response (3 Vp-p) is flat out to about 30 MHz.
With split rails the per channel supply current is a typical 8.5 mA (the electrical specs in the data sheet do not note that this is per channel) while shutdown current is a typical 13 µA. The channel-to-channel isolation is not noted in the data sheet and need to be at least 60 dB. The rails can be up to 12 V.
Input voltage noise is a typical 1.7 nV/rtHz making it pretty irrelevant in video work, the input offset is a typical -0.5 mV, while the output swing is typically ±3.8 V with a 150-ohm load and ±5-V rails. The output can sink or source an absolute maximum rating of 200 mA (note that there is no internal current limiting and a short-circuit load would likely destroy the device). PSRR for the positive rail is 60 dB out to 1 MHz and then falls off to about 25 dB at 100 MHz; for the negative rail it is 60 dB out to about 10 kHz and then more gently rolls out to about 28 dB at 100 MHz. CMRR is better than -60 dB through 1 MHz.
THD (150-ohm load, gain = 2 and split 5-V rails) is about -80 dB at 1 MHz and meanders to about -68 dB at 8 MHz through 16 MHz; it then falls off to about -60 dB at 36 MHz.
Intersil are showing once more that they know the markets they are addressing and are receiving positive, controlled feedback from their customer base. The EL5367 is going to be a big deal in higher resolution monitors as GBR amplifiers, and in other high-frequency cable driver applications. The part will also find homes in IF applications, where the amplifiers can be chained together in series with external filters between them. The current consumption makes them particularly attractive for higher-speed portable instrumentation. It is correctly priced.
The EL5367 is in production in QSOP-16 and is priced at $2.99 in 1000-piece lots.