Diodes Incorporated has launched the AL8400 linear LED driver controller designed to regulate LED current via an external transistor across wide variations of high brightness LEDs.
The controller is capable of directly operating from 2.2V to 18V and will drive either N-channel MOSFET or NPN Bipolar transistors, and it can be widely used in LED chains includeing illumination, indication or signage systems.
It has a very low 200mV current sense voltage. Its open collector output drives the external pass transistor allowing it to regulate LED current from tens of mA to above an amp.
In addition,using an external pass transistor allows power dissipation and maximum drive capability to be optimized.
The LED driver’s low temperature drift and 3% reference voltage at 25ºC outperforms most existing linear solutions while keeping system costs down at the same time.
