4 ms·
Too much complexity without any benefit (when adjusted for new failure cases and cost of additional components and complexity). Electronics is mostly KISS, not
by milankragujevic 5y ago
Too much complexity without any benefit (when adjusted for new failure cases and cost of additional components and complexity).
Electronics is mostly KISS, not only motivated by the financial factor but also reliability, manufacturing, etc.
So far micro controllers are too expensive, too sensitive to unstable power supply, too complex in general (requiring some support components in some cases, have an additional prefabrication step for flashing firmware by the chip vendor, and cost a lot more.
There is no clear advantage to the approach you mentioned.
- userbinator 5y agoThe "new failure cases" it adds are rather exciting -- if the MCU locks up or glitches, which they are prone to, then it could short the supply rails and blow the switching transistors, or destroy the connected load by overvoltage. Analog control ICs, while they are not 100% reliable either, have many safeguards built-in that can react nearly instantaneously and don't depend on the relatively complex process of executing machine instructions.
- londons_explore 5y agoThere are plenty of systems where a software failure leads to permanent hardware failure. This would just be one more.
- londons_explore 5y agoThe main benefit is probably a wider flatter efficiency curve. Instead of saying "this power supply is 98% efficient when delivering 1 Amp (but more like 80% efficient at 0.1 amps or 2 amps), the power supply can adjust the switching frequency to trade off switching losses and output ripple for efficiency if the application allows.