Since being introduced in 2005 the PMBus™ power management protocol has been widely adopted and is the accepted standard for digital power management. Bob White's three hour seminar will provide a detailed look at two major features introduced in the recent Revision 1.3, Zone Protocols and the AVSBus, as well as a .review on the basics of the PMBus protocol. It will be held at APEC on Sunday, March 20, 2016 from 2:30 - 6:30PM in Long Beach, CA.
The seminar is divided into two parts with a half hour break in between. The first half of the seminar reviews the basics of the 2-wire SMBus including the electrical interface and how data is transferred from one device to another. PMBus specific features such as the CONTROL signal and the use of SMBALERT# interrupt signal will be reviewed. A summary of the PMBus command language and numerical formats will be presented, including the new floating point format introduced in Revision 1.3. Other areas covered are setting and adjusting the output voltage, fault management, and status reporting.
The second half of the seminar takes a deeper look at the two major PMBus additions introduced in Revision 1.3. The Zone Protocols offer important new tools for managing the larger and more complex power systems in today's equipment. Zone commands enable the simultaneous sending of commands and polling of multiple devices. The AVSBus is an all new protocol with an SPI-like interface that can operate at speeds up to 50 MHz. With a compact set of commands and fixed 32 bit frame, the AVSBus allows devices such as microprocessors, ASICs and FPGAs to quickly command changes to their operating voltage, improving performance and saving energy.
