ADP3170
Designing an Inductor
Once the inductance is known, the next step is either to design
an inductor or find a standard inductor that comes as close as
possible to meeting the overall design goals. The first decision
in designing the inductor is to choose the core material. There
are several possibilities for providing low core loss at high fre-
quencies. Two examples are the powder cores (e.g., Kool-M®
from Magnetics, Inc.) and the gapped soft ferrite cores (e.g.,
3F3 or 3F4 from Philips). Low frequency powdered iron cores
should be avoided due to their high core loss, especially when
the inductor value is relatively low and the ripple current is high.
Two main core types can be used in this application. Open
magnetic loop types, such as beads, beads on leads, and rods
and slugs, provide lower cost but do not have a focused mag-
netic field in the core. The radiated EMI from the distributed
magnetic field may create problems with noise interference in
the circuitry surrounding the inductor. Closed-loop types,
such as pot cores, PQ, U, and E cores, or toroids, cost more, but
have much better EMI/RFI performance. A good compromise
between price and performance are cores with a toroidal shape.
There are many useful references for quickly designing a power
inductor. Table II gives some examples.
Table II. Magnetics Design References
Magnetic Designer Software
Intusoft (http://www.intusoft.com)
Designing Magnetic Components for High-Frequency DC-DC
Converters
McLyman, Kg Magnetics
ISBN 1-883107-00-08
L1
1.7H
5V
D1
MBR052LT1
12V
C1
1000F
C2
1000F
C6
C7
4.7nF 100nF
C3
1000F
C4
1000F
U1
ADP3170
5V SB
D2
MBR052LT1
FROM
CPU
VTT PWRGD CLK
1 VID3
2 VID2
3 VID1
4 VID0
5 VID25
6 PWRGD
7 REF
8 SD
9 FB
10 CS–
GND 20
PGND 19
DRVH 18
DRVL 17
VCC 16
LRFB 15
LRDRV 14
COMP 13
CT 12
CS+ 11
C5
1000F
C12
22F
Q1
FDB7045L
L1
1H
R6
2.5m⍀
1000F ؋ 8
RUBYCON ZA SERIES
24m⍀ ESR (EACH)
Q2
FDB7045L
C13 C14 C15 C16 C17 C18 C19 C20
C19
150pF
COC
2.7nF
RB
30.1k⍀
1%
RA
13.7k⍀
1%
C22
68pF
5V SB R7
Q6
10k⍀
IRL3103
C21
1F
C8
100pF
R1
1k⍀
C11
1nF
R4
220⍀
R5
220⍀
C23
220F
Figure 3. 24 A VRM 8.5-Compliant CPU Supply
VCC(CORE)
1.05V – 1.825V
23A
VCC(CORE) RTN
1.8V SB
1.8V, 200mA
CORE
PWRGD
TO CPU
REV. 0
–9–