System and method for controlling a point-of-load regulator
First Claim
1. A power control system comprising:
- at least one point-of-load regulator;
a bi-directional serial bus connected to said at least one point-of-load regulator; and
a power supply controller connected to said bi-directional serial bus and adapted to send and receive digital data to and from said at least one point-of-load regulator via said bi-directional serial bus.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A system and method is provided for using a serial bus to communicate (either passively or actively) with a point-of-load (“POL”) regulator. Specifically, a power supply controller (“controller”) communicates with at least one POL regulators by writing and/or reading data (either synchronously or asynchronous) over a unidirectional or bi-directional serial bus. In one embodiment of the present invention, the controller is adapted to write initial-configuration data (e.g., output voltage set-point, current limit set-point, etc.) to at least one POL regulator via the serial bus. At least a portion of the initial-configuration data is then used by the POL regulator to produce a particular output. In another embodiment of the invention, each POL regulator includes at least one register for maintaining POL information, such as unique identification information, fault protection information, output voltage set-point data, current limit set-point data, etc. The controller is then adapted to monitor and retrieve this information (i.e., fault-monitoring data) via the serial bus while the POL regulators are operating.
91 Citations
22 Claims
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1. A power control system comprising:
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at least one point-of-load regulator;
a bi-directional serial bus connected to said at least one point-of-load regulator; and
a power supply controller connected to said bi-directional serial bus and adapted to send and receive digital data to and from said at least one point-of-load regulator via said bi-directional serial bus. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5)
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6. A power control system comprising:
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a plurality of point-of-load regulators;
a serial bus connected to said plurality of point-of-load regulators; and
a power supply controller connected to said serial bus and adapted to send digital data to said plurality of point-of-load regulators via said serial bus. - View Dependent Claims (7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14)
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15. A method of controlling a plurality of point-of-load regulators, comprising:
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serially transmitting over a common bus digital initial-configuration data to said plurality of point-of-load regulators;
providing regulated voltage in accordance with at least a portion of said digital initial-configuration data;
serially transmitting over said common bus digital fault-monitoring data from said plurality of point-of-load regulators; and
using said digital fault-monitoring data to monitor the output voltage of each one of said plurality of point-of-load regulators. - View Dependent Claims (16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22)
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Specification