IS6102A - Empowering Server Safety and Reliability: A New Choice for Multi-Protection E-Fuse
IS6102A - Empowering Server Safety and Reliability: A New Choice for Multi-Protection E-Fuse
In today's highly digitalized and data-driven era, data centers are expanding at an unprecedented pace and depth. Servers and communication equipment, as the critical infrastructure supporting this technological revolution, bear the crucial role of processing complex algorithms and massive amounts of data.
To ensure the stability and high efficiency of data centers, a substantial number of high-power input power supplies are required to support the simultaneous operation of multiple computing systems. In such complex environments, users need to ensure effective overcurrent protection isolation is established between the main power supply and subsystems, to prevent local faults from affecting the normal operation of the entire system.
Traditional fuses, as one-time protection components, face challenges such as slow response speed, overcurrent protection points being easily affected by ambient temperature, and singular protection functions, making them unable to meet the server's demand for rapid circuit protection during high-frequency operation. In contrast, E-Fuses utilize electronic control to achieve fast response and precise protection, supporting detection and output cutoff at the nanosecond level, thereby effectively preventing damage to other equipment or data loss caused by current overload or short circuits. They also eliminate the high-cost maintenance and complex selection issues associated with the self-destructive protection of thermal fuses. Featuring programmable, self-recovering, diagnosable, and other more versatile functions, they significantly reduce user costs during the design and maintenance phases.
IVS's latest offering, the IS6102A 15A E-Fuse, supports a wide input voltage range of 4.5V-16V. It internally integrates a power MOSFET with a minimum Rds(on) of 3mΩ and various monitoring and protection modules, allowing users to preset protection configurations to control the chip's state. Once an anomaly occurs, the IS6102A can rapidly control the Field-Effect Transistor (FET) to turn off, ensuring effective limitation of current and voltage to safe levels under circuit fault conditions.
High-Precision Current Monitoring
The demands of high-power complex loads like GPUs and DPUs present a significant challenge for data center power supply design. The IS6102A provides high-precision current monitoring (IMON), enabling highly accurate proportional current conversion of the real-time current flowing through the FET. It converts the current into a voltage signal fed back to the power management system, achieving a current monitoring accuracy of ±3% (within the 6A < Io < 15A range), effectively enhancing the power system's ability to manage and control the load and current.
Support for Hot Plug and Self-Recovery Applications
Once a traditional fuse trips, it typically requires shutting down the entire system and troubleshooting the blown fuse before power can be restored. In multi-device applications involving data processing and computation, a complete power shutdown may lead to loss of computational data, and partial application downtime maintenance can be extremely costly.
The IS6102A supports automatic recovery operation after transient fault conditions to reduce downtime and operational disruption risks, extending equipment service life. During continuous fault occurrences, it supports monitoring and anomaly reporting, allowing users to quickly diagnose the cause and assist maintenance personnel in rapidly locating the anomaly point, significantly saving fault investigation time and labor costs.
For non-recoverable faults or situations requiring maintenance or expansion of device components, the IS6102A's Hot Plug capability allows adjustable insertion delay time to be set via peripheral components. This prevents excessively high frequency and voltage spikes during insertion, avoiding device breakdown damage and bus interference issues.
Simultaneously, the IS6102A incorporates an adjustable soft-start rate module. Users can set different startup rates according to requirements, effectively suppressing inrush current and better protecting downstream components.
More Compact Size and Higher Utilization
The IS6102A adopts a 3 mm x 5 mm 22-Pin QFN package. Compared to fuses, it offers higher current density, richer functionality, faster and more accurate shutdown speed, while providing high reliability and consistent protection performance. Its programmable characteristics make it suitable for various complex load and high component density application scenarios, offering high cost-effectiveness.
Faster Fault Response
While integrating hot plug and surge protection functions, the IS6102A also supports detection and rapid response to faults both upstream and downstream.
To avoid downtime caused by short circuits or overloads in upstream power supplies or components, the IS6102A can ensure the chip operates within the user-preset current limit even during power loss. The maximum current limit of the E-Fuse is set via the ISET pin. When the monitored current exceeds the set value, the chip rapidly controls the FET to enter the variable resistance region, limits the current, and initiates fault timing. If the current returns to normal within the timing period, it is identified as a temporary fault and normal operation resumes (OC RECOVER). Conversely, if the current fails to drop below the set value after the timer ends, the chip will pull the fault report pin low and quickly cut off the circuit (OCP).
When a downstream component experiences a short circuit, the current increases instantaneously to a very high value. To prevent high current from affecting upstream components, the IS6102A supports fast overcurrent protection (SCP) within 200ns. If judged as a temporary fault, the chip will attempt a current-limited restart after a period. Continuous SCP will cause the chip to LATCH OFF, entering a fault shutdown state.
Furthermore, the IS6102A integrates comprehensive fault detection and protection functions, including Input Overvoltage Protection (OVP) and Overtemperature Protection (OTP), to respond quickly to faults, reduce the system's susceptibility to fault conditions, and lower maintenance costs and troubleshooting difficulty.