Page Comparison

What is a buck converter? What does it look like?

How does a buck converter work?

What is the difference between a synchronous and asynchronous buck converter?

What is a duty cycle?

What is the voltage transfer function of a buck converter? Consequently, what determines the output voltage and why? How can you calculate the duty cycle given input and output voltage design requirements?

What happens at 100% and 0% duty cycle?

What do the waveforms for the inductor voltage and current look like

What do the waveforms for the capacitor voltage and current look like

What is the purpose of the output inductor?

What is the purpose of the output capacitor?

What direction does current flow in the inductor and capacitor in the two switching states?

Why is the inductor current a linear ramp? (Think back to the fact that buck converters are used for DC-DC conversion)

When does the output capacitor charge/discharge

Why is input capacitance needed? What happens if it’s removed?

What is voltage and current ripple? What parameters control the magnitude of the output voltage and current ripple? (important)

What determines the inductor current slope?

What is dead-time insertion? Why is it a must have?

How does a MOSFET’s parasitic internal body diode play a role in the workings of a buck converter?

Where is inductor current sourced from in the off-state?

Why do N-channel MOSFETs require additional circuitry to switch on? What are those circuits called? How do they work?

What happens to a bootstrap circuit when a half-bridge operates at too high of a duty cycle? What issues arise?

What is the difference between a buck converter vs LDO? What are the tradeoffs?

When can an LDO be more efficient than a buck converter?