7.1.1 Electrical Performance

The power block has the ability to switch voltages at rates greater than 10 kV/µs. Special care must be then taken with the PCB layout design and placement of the input capacitors, driver IC, and output inductor.

• The placement of the input capacitors relative to the power block’s VIN and PGND pins should have the highest priority during the component placement routine. It is critical to minimize these node lengths. As such, ceramic input capacitors need to be placed as close as possible to the VIN and PGND pins (see Figure 34). The example in Figure 34 uses 6 × 10-µF ceramic capacitors (TDK part C3216X5R1C106KT or equivalent). Notice there are ceramic capacitors on both sides of the board with an appropriate amount of vias interconnecting both layers. In terms of priority of placement next to the power block, C5, C7, C19, and C8 should follow in order.
• The driver IC should be placed relatively close to the power block gate pins. T_G and B_G should connect to the outputs of the driver IC. The T_GR pin serves as the return path of the high-side gate drive circuitry and should be connected to the phase pin of the IC (sometimes called LX, LL, SW, PH, etc.). The bootstrap capacitor for the driver IC will also connect to this pin.
• The switching node of the output inductor should be placed relatively close to the power block VSW pins. Minimizing the node length between these two components will reduce the PCB conduction losses and actually reduce the switching noise level. In the event the switch node waveform exhibits ringing that reaches undesirable levels, the use of a boost resistor or RC snubber can be an effective way to easily reduce the peak ring level. The recommended boost resistor value will range between 1 Ω to 4.7 Ω depending on the output characteristics of driver IC used in conjunction with the power block. The RC snubber values can range from 0.5 Ω to 2.2 Ω for the R and 330 pF to 2200 pF for the C. Please refer to Snubber Circuits: Theory, Design and Application (SLUP100) for more details on how to properly tune the RC snubber values. The RC snubber should be placed as close as possible to the VSW node and PGND see Figure 34. ⁽¹⁾

7.1.2 Thermal Performance

The power block has the ability to utilize the GND planes as the primary thermal path. As such, the use of thermal vias is an effective way to pull away heat from the device and into the system board. Concerns of solder voids and manufacturability problems can be addressed by the use of three basic tactics to minimize the amount of solder attach that will wick down the via barrel:

• Intentionally space out the vias from each other to avoid a cluster of holes in a given area.
• Use the smallest drill size allowed in your design. The example in Figure 34 uses vias with a 10-mil drill hole and a 16-mil capture pad.
• Tent the opposite side of the via with solder-mask.

In the end, the number and drill size of the thermal vias should align with the end user’s PCB design rules and manufacturing capabilities.