FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention is in the field of booster stage circuit for a power amplifier, and an external supply voltage power amplifier comprising said booster stage circuit, such as for ampli fying an electronic signal to a speaker system (audio amplifier). These amplifiers may be pro vided with an external supply voltage.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Prior art electronic amplifier circuits are often limited in the range of output voltages that they can provide by the supply voltage that they are provided with. For battery-operated devices this can be problematic when the battery voltage is not sufficiently high to deliver the desired output signals (under all circumstances). This is for example a problem in audio amplifiers which typically have output signals with peak signals that are many factors higher than the average sig nal power (so called high crest-factor).

To overcome this supply limitation, many amplifier circuit extensions have been proposed in the past that momentarily boost the available supply voltage beyond what is available from the external supply. Two approaches may be noted in particular: circuits that use a big storage ca pacitor (a ‘flying capacitor’) that can momentarily double the supply, such as in US8212620, which document shows an amplifier device including an amplifier having an input for receiving an audio input signal and an output for sending an output signal to a load, wherein a boosted-rail circuit is connected to a power source and has a single boosted rail connected to the BTL ampli fier, such as shown in figure la and further circuits that use a separate switching power stage to generate the local supply, typically consisting of a booster circuit with an inductor and capacitor as shown in Figure lb. Both variants of the prior art that was discussed above still has problems. In case of the flying capacitor, a primary problem is that it discharges during use and can only achieve as a maximum a doubling of the supply. Also, when it is heavily discharged, re-charging will give power dissipation, such as in a diode being present. In case of the switching booster, a problem is that it takes time to charge the local supply 15 above the external supply 5. In more detail, this second problem entails the following: when a boost phase is desired, the inductor 10 first has to be charged by connecting it to ground 35 via the bottom transistor 30, which has a side-effect that the local supply 15 drops before it is boosted. This initial charging gives a mo mentary drop in the output before it starts to rise above the supply, and is a manifestation of the ‘right-half-plane’ zero that is a well-known problem in control of switching booster stages in general. In the application for the amplifier, it means that either some headroom is needed in the control of the supply (to give some margin for undesired supply variations), or some delay is needed in the processing of the input to be able to Took ahead’ and anticipate with the switching before the boost is actually needed. Another disadvantage of the switching booster in Figure lb is that the supply current always runs through the primary inductor 10, even when no boost is needed. The parasitic resistance of this inductor causes additional losses. Incidentally US 2018/115246 A1 recites a system including a combination of a boost con verter and a power converter coupled together in series, such that the series combination boosts an input voltage to the series combination to an output voltage greater than the input voltage such that a voltage boost provided by the series combination is greater than a voltage boost pro vided by the boost converter alone. The system may also include an amplifier, wherein an input of the amplifier is coupled to an output of the series combination of the boost converter and the power converter. The system is however relatively complex, and not very energy efficient.

It is an objective of the present invention to overcome disadvantages of the prior art booster circuits, and especially electrical and audio functioning thereof, without jeopardizing functionality and advantages.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates in a first aspect to a booster stage circuit according to claim 1 for a power amplifier circuit for amplifying an input signal and generating an output signal, including a circuit to generate the supply rail voltage to the power amplifier. The supply voltage for the power amplifier is lifted by a flying capacitor when the output signal exceeds the voltage that is available from an external supply (e.g. a battery). The flying capacitor is automatically recharged with high efficiency after each lifting cycle through an inductor, also increasing the voltage across the flying capacitor to above the external supply. When boosting is needed, then the capacitor 240 is lifted and placed in series with the supply by switch-transistor 230. As such, an instantaneous doubling of the supply is available, without the charging delay present in the booster prior-art in Figure lb. When switch-transistor 230 closes, current will also start to build up in the primary inductor 210. This inductor current will re-charge capacitor 240 when the circuit returns to the normal supply by opening 230 and closing 220. By alternating sufficiently fast be tween the normal supply 220 closed, 230 open and the boosted supply 220 open and 230 closed, a relatively small capacitance value 240 can be used while avoiding significant discharge, which is a marked advantage over the traditional flying capacitor supply doubler. On top of the above func tionality, what also happens is that the average voltage on the flying capacitor increases, as a func tion of the duty cycle of the two switching phases. Also no degradation of power efficiency is provided as the capacitor is recharged with a high efficiency through the inductor 35 instead of through a dissipating diode 50 in the prior art of Figure la. As with other booster circuits switching between modes can take place with variable, namely limited or full, energy transfer from the in ductor to the capacitor.

So the present booster stage circuit is specifically suited for a power amplifier, and com prises an electrical connector 5 for an external power supply, at least one capacitor 240, the capac itor having a first side and a second side, the capacitor being electrically connected at a first side thereof to at least one first switch (220) and at a second side to at least one second switch (230), , typically a single first switch 220 and/or a single second switch 230, wherein each individual switch is adapted to operate at a switching frequency of >20 kHz, wherein each individual switch with another side is adapted to be electrically connected to the electrical connector 5 note that the “switch side” could be on the capacitor side and on the electrical connector side, and wherein in a boost mode the at least one first switch 220 at one side of the capacitor is in an open status and the at least one second switch 230 at the other side of the capacitor is in an closed status, or wherein in a base mode the at least one first switch 220 at one side of the capacitor is in an closed status and the at least one second switch 230 at the other side of the capacitor is in an open status, at least one inductor 210 at one side electrically connected to (i) one side of the capacitor 240, and (ii) with at least one of the first switch 220, and at the other side (iii) with a ground, inputs 261 and 262 are adapted for receiving control input from a controller for operating the at least one first switch 220 and the at least one second switch 230, respectively, and optionally a controller for operating the at least one first and at least one second switch 220, 230. Were reference is made to “ground” also the lower input voltage of a supply can be referred to. In between boost mode and base mode the switches 220,230 may both be open, which may be referred to as a dead zone mode, in order to prevent shorts.

In a second aspect the present invention relates to an external supply voltage power ampli fier 60 comprising at least one booster stage circuit according to any of claims 1-8, wherein the power amplifier is selected from an audio amplifier, a hearing aid amplifier, an electric motor control amplifier, a variable power supply unit, a time varying power supply, and combinations thereof.

Applications are especially those amplifiers that have a fixed supply voltage, either be cause they are battery powered (including automotive amplifiers) or because the supply-unit is fixed. A primary application is audio amplifiers. However, the concept is easily extended to other fields, e.g. electric motor control, variable power supply units, or any other field where time-varying power-signal are desired.

Thereby the present invention provides a solution to one or more of the above mentioned problems.

Advantages of the present description are detailed throughout the description.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates in a first aspect to a booster stage circuit according to claim 1.

In an exemplary embodiment of the present booster stage circuit the at least one first and at least one second switch 220, 230 may each individually be selected from a transistor, such as an NMOS transistor, a PMOS transistor, a bipolar transistor, a FET, such as a GaN FET, an IGBT, and combinations thereof.

In an exemplary embodiment of the present booster stage circuit the at least one capacitor 240 may each be individually selected from a ceramic capacitor, a fill capacitor, an electrolytic capacitor, a non-polarized capacitor, a multilayer capacitor, with a capacitance of 10 pF- 10000 pF, preferably 50 pF- 100 pF, more preferably 100 pF- 50 pF, even more preferably 1 nF- 5 pF, such as 100 nF- 1 pF, and combinations thereof. For a high power application a larger capaci tance is preferred.

In an exemplary embodiment of the present booster stage circuit the at least one inductor 210 may each individually be selected from an air-core inductor, a ferro-magnetic-core inductor, a variable inductor, a choke, a solenoid, with an inductance of 10 nH-20 H, preferably 0.1 mH-10 H, more preferably 1 pH-l H, such as 100 mH-0.01 H, and combinations thereof.

In an exemplary embodiment of the present booster stage circuit each individual switch may be adapted to operate at a switching frequency of 50 kHz-2.4 GHz, preferably 100 kHz-1.2 GHz, such as 250 kHz-30 MHz.

In an exemplary embodiment the present booster stage circuit may further comprise a feed back loop details thereof, preferably wherein the feedback loop comprises a feedback filter.

In an exemplary embodiment the present booster stage circuit may further comprise a clock, wherein the clock is adapted to provide a clock frequency of > 50 kHz, preferably 100 kHz-10 GHz, more preferably 300 kHz-2.4 GHz, such as 500 kHz-1.2 GHz.

In an exemplary embodiment the present booster stage circuit may further comprise a recti fier parallel to the at least one switch 220,230, such as a diode, or a second capacitor parallel to the first capacitor and a third switch in between the first and second capacitor, and combinations thereof.

The invention although described in detailed explanatory context may be best under stood in conjunction with the accompanying examples and figures.

SUMMARY OF FIGURES

Fig. la-b, 2-3, 3a-c, and 4-12 show details of booster circuits.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF FIGURES

The figures are of an exemplary nature. Elements of the figures may be combined.

In the figures:

100a,b Booster circuit

5 electrical connector to a supply

10 inductor

15 electrical connector

20 first switch

25 electrical connector

30 second switch

35 electrical connector to return of the supply or ground

40 capacitor

50 rectifier, such as diode

60 audio amplifier

70 third switch

75 electrical connector

80 fourth switch

90 inductor

105 electrical connector

115 electrical connector

110 speaker

120 capacitor 121 capacitor

130 inductor

140 fifth switch

145 electrical connector

150 sixth switch

210 inductor

215 electrical connector

215a electrical connector

215b electrical connector

220 first switch

225 electrical connector

230 second switch

240 capacitor

250 control circuit

255 inductor current sense connector

260 gate driver circuit

261 electrical connector

262 electrical connector

266 electrical connector

267 electrical connector

268 electrical connector

269 electrical connector

Fig. la shows prior art circuits that use a big storage capacitor (a ‘flying capacitor’) that can momentarily double the supply, as shown in Figure la (with various embodiments conceiva ble).

Fig. lb shows prior art circuits that use a separate switching power stage to generate the local supply, typically consisting of a booster circuit with an inductor 10 and capacitor 40. The control and transistors for such an amplifier are for example present in Texas Instruments TAS2563.

Figure 2 shows a present circuit which can be considered as a combination of the flying- capacitor supply doubler (augmenting the supply with the voltage stored on the capacitor) and a switching booster, overcoming the above drawbacks. During normal operation, in the base mode, such as when no boosting is needed, the local supply 215 is directly connected to the external supply 5, with only a switch-transistor 220 in between, so there is no additional dissipation in a supply inductor. During this operation, the voltage across the flying capacitor 240 becomes equal to the supply 5 because its bottom plate is discharged to ground 35 via the inductor 210.

When boosting is needed, then the capacitor 240 is lifted and placed in series with the sup ply by switch-transistor 230. As such, an instantaneous doubling of the supply is available, with out the charging delay present in the booster prior-art in Figure lb. When switch-transistor 230 closes, current will also start to build-up in the primary inductor 210. This inductor current will re-charge capacitor 240 when the circuit returns to the normal supply by opening 230 and closing 220. By alternating sufficiently fast between the normal supply 220 closed, 230 open) and the boosted supply (220 open and 230 closed), a relatively small capacitance value 240 can be used while avoiding significant discharge, which is a marked advantage over the traditional flying ca pacitor supply doubler (prior art of fig. la).

On top of the above functionality, what also occurs is that the average voltage on the flying capacitor increases, as a function of the duty cycle of the two switching phases, following similar relations as other switching converters. An example of the voltage and current waveforms in volved are shown in Figures 3a-c.

Various extensions of the concept are possible. First of all, the boost stage can be loaded with multiple amplifiers in parallel, with an example with two amplifiers (60a and 60b) shown in Figure 4. A similar technique can be used with a conventional booster from Figure lb, but with the conventional booster, all amplifiers will automatically use the higher supply even if their out put does not require a higher supply, leading to more power consumption. In the proposed topol ogy of Figure 4, the rail-voltage on 215 is at the normal supply during part of the cycle and at the boosted voltage during another. Switching schemes can be arranged such that any amplifier that only needs to produce small output voltages can switch its transistors to the rail 215 when that rail is at the normal supply, while those amplifiers that need higher output voltage use the rail 215 when it is boosted.

Control of the boosted stage

The signals that control the behavior of the switches in the booster 220 & 230 can be derived based on an input signal with pulse-width modulation techniques, possibly with compensation of the non-linear pulse-width to voltage relation, similar to what is for example done for a conven tional boost circuit. As is customary in switching power converters, for better control over the output signals, the output voltage 215 and/or the current in the inductor 255 can be sensed and fed back to the controller 250, as is shown in Figure 9. For the voltage and/or current-sensing, any of the various methods known in the field of power conversion for can be applied. The con troller 250 itself can be an analog circuit or a digital controller. A digital controller, e.g. the one described in [WO2017/179974], first digitizes the sensed signals with analog to digital convert ers and subsequently uses digital control algorithms to create the pulse-width modulated (PWM) signals. Regardless of the method of control, once the PWM signals are created they need to be converted to the proper voltage levels to control the switches, which is usually done in a so- called Gate driver circuit 260.

Another option is to cascade multiple booster stages, as shown in Figure 5. In such a cas cade, the output (215a) of the first booster stage (100a) is connected to the supply input of the second booster stage (100b), which in turn creates the local supply (215b) for the amplifier. Which such a cascade, higher boosting factors are easier to achieve than with a single boosting stage. When the boost mode of the two stages is done simultaneous, then the external supply can be tripled at the onset of the boosting mode, with higher boosting factors possible once the ca pacitors are charged to higher values. Alternatively, when the boosting and base mode of the two stages are alternated, then the amplifier supply (215b) can get a boosted supply for a longer per centage of the time.

Another embodiment of the booster stage is shown in Figure 6. This embodiment (101) is the inverting, negative side equivalent of the supply-booster (100). Instead of lifting the supply, the flying capacitor (241) is now used to boost the low side of the amplifier supply (226). In base mode, switch (231) connects the low side of the amplifier (226) to ground (35). In boost mode, switch (231) opens and switch (221) closes, pushing the low side (226) below ground with a voltage equal to the stored voltage on capacitor (241), while simultaneous charging the capacitor (241) via inductor (211) which is connected to the external supply (5).

A combination of the high-side booster (100) and a low-side booster (101) leads to the em bodiment shown in Figure 7. This embodiment enables boosting of both sides of the supply of the amplifier (60) which not only enables larger boosting factors, but also enables a more bal anced behavior, in the sense that the voltages at both ends of the load (110) can change in oppos ing directions, also during boost modes. Such balanced or differential behavior can reduce the electromagnetic interference (EMI) generated by the amplifier.

Another amplifier embodiment that is enabled by the combination of a high-side and low- side booster from Figure 7 is a single-ended amplifier, as shown in Figure 8. The single-ended amplifier (61) normally requires a positive and a negative supply voltage to be able to generate positive and negative output voltages. With the low-side booster stage (101), the negative supply voltages (226) can be created on demand. The high-side booster stage (100) also enables positive output voltages above the external supply (5). It would also be possible to omit the high-side booster (100) and connect the amplifier supply (215) directly to the external supply (5), but then the highest positive voltage on the load would be limited by the supply.

Further combinations of the various embodiments are of course also possible, such as the use of a cascade of boosters (as in Figure 5) in a symmetric configuration (as in Figure 7 or Fig ure 8), or the use of multiple amplifiers (as in Figure 4) in a symmetric configuration.

Another option is to sense the output voltages of the amplifier as shown in Figure 10 and use those signals 105 and 115 as an indirect indication of the rail voltage.

Even better results can be achieved when the same controller controls both the booster stage as well as the amplifier signals itself, as shown in Figure 11, because such a controller knows when the booster stage is active and with which duty cycle, to which it can adapt the pulse-widths send to the switching amplifier. To further enhance its behavior, such a controller might not only sense the output voltage 105 and 115 but possibly also the rail voltage 215 and/or the current through the inductor (signal 255 in Figure 9).