Power Integrations' Expert power supply design software

20th November 2006

ES Admin

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Power Integrations has introduced a new version of its popular PI Expert power supply design software – plus a new online Rapid Transformer Sample Service (RTSS) for transformer prototyping. PI Expert 6.5 includes PI’s latest TinySwitch-III, PeakSwitch and LinkSwitch-LP products, and automates power supply circuit design, component selection and transformer construction, while RTSS promises to trim days from the construction of transformer designs generated by the software. This combined new offering from PI enables OEMs with little power supply experience to successfully prototype their own hardware, and overcomes a critical hurdle for power supply merchants rushing to redesign their products ahead of new energy-efficiency rules that come into effect in 2007.

“PI Expert is extremely popular among the power supply design community,” said Doug Bailey, vice president of marketing, Power Integrations. “This latest version of the software adds support for all of the products we have launched in 2006, and includes new features such as Bode plots of the feedback network and upgraded transformer design algorithms. By linking PI Expert to the RTSS, we have addressed the needs of customers who do not have dedicated resources in-house to iterate and optimize transformer prototypes. This eliminates one of the most error-prone and time-consuming tasks of power supply design and will speed our customers’ time to market substantially.”

The new PI Expert 6.5 provides a built-in PI product selector guide and offers extended PI device support and component libraries. It also offers three new design optimization features: control loop simulation and feedback circuit calculations to enable circuit optimizations, and mechanical diagrams in PI Transformer Designer to enable transformer winding accuracy.

A transformer sits at the heart of every power supply design, affecting operation, safety and EMI performance. PI Expert produces winding specifications for the PI Transformer Designer utility using patented EMI-reducing shield-winding algorithms. The transformer output from PI Expert can be submitted to the RTSS for rapid prototyping and delivery. Sample services are available from two providers today, Power Integrations and ICE Components; other providers may be added in the future.