Vishay - IR Receivers Optimized for Extremely Noisy Environments and Short Burst Codes

Vishay's AGC5 devices are immune to dimmed LCD backlighting, noise from plasma screens, and any fluorescent lamps, leading sources of environmental optical noise severely impacting the performance of IR systems.

With an improved immunity against ambient light and insensitivity to supply voltage ripple and noise, the IR receivers are optimized for remote control applications in industrial and consumer applications, including set-top boxes, LCD TVs, and DVD players, in which a robust transmission range and a clean signal in the presence of optical noise are extremely important.

Each receiver includes a photo detector and preamplifier circuit, mounted within an epoxy-encapsulated module that acts as an IR filter. The AGC5 receivers are specified for operation from 2.5 V to 5.5 V with a minimum irradiance of 0.1 to 0.15 mW/m2, depending on the package. This translates to a transmission range of 45 meters in dark ambients for most standard remote controls. The modules feature a carrier frequency range from 30 kHz to 56 kHz, offer a low 0.35 mA supply current, and comply with RoHS 2002/95/EC and WEEE 2002/96/EC.

A simple interactive graph at www.vishay.com/ir-receiver-modules/i-graph.html visually demonstrates how remote control codes, AGC values, and optical noise sources are related. On the IR remote control receiver page of Vishay's website, engineers are able to select the best device based on the remote control code being used. The Best AGC column shows which one of the five different AGCs is best suited for the application. More information is available at www.vishay.com/ir-receiver-modules/.

Samples and production quantities of the AGC5 IR receivers are available now, with lead times of four to six weeks for large orders.