The printed-circuit-board (PCB) should use a heavy ground plane. For optimal electrical and thermal performance, the DRV8801-Q1 must be soldered directly onto the board. On the underside of the DRV8801-Q1 is a thermal pad, which provides a path for enhanced thermal dissipation. The thermal pad should be soldered directly to an exposed surface on the PCB. Thermal vias are used to transfer heat to other layers of the PCB.
The load supply pin VBB, should be decoupled with an electrolytic capacitor (typically 100 µF) in parallel with a ceramic capacitor (0.1 µF) placed as close as possible to the device.
The ceramic capacitors (0.1 µF) between VCP and VBB and between CP1 and CP2 should be placed as close as possible to the device.
The SENSE resistor should be close as possible to the SENSE pin and ground return to minimize parasitic inductance.