austriamicro's high-current LED driver matches up with mobiles

The AS1101 from austriamicrosystems will drive two parallel-connected LEDs of any color with up to 80mA per LED for backlighting small displays. The device, featuring matched outputs, is also suited to lighting management for battery-powered audio devices such as MP3 and CD players, and mobile and cordless phones, PDAs, portable DVD players and consumer electronics that require high-efficiency backlighting.

The chip, with analog and PWM brightness control, touts low dropout (less than 150mV), no switching noise and EMI-free operation, and a shutdown current of less than 1?A (an enable-shutdown input is provided). LED current is programmable using an external resistor. As such, it's suitable for direct connection to a lithium-ion battery. No current matching is required, and so no additional external components are needed.

The AS1101 is available in an SC70-6 package and is pin-to-pin compatible with the FAN5614 LED driver from Fairchild Semiconductor. Other members of the family to come include the AS1102, AS1103 and AS1104 for three- and four-diode applications. The AS1101 is priced at 34 cents each in 1,000-piece orders.

- Vincent Biancomano
eeProductCenter