To back up the company’s expertise in building advanced Semiconductor technology for USB PD purposes, FTDI Chip has announced a new development solution. This hardware is based on its FT4233HP multi-channel interface ICs.
This new high-speed USB serial/FIFO evaluation board will allow engineers to start far quicker on implementing USB power delivery arrangements. This may be for the retrofitting of this functionality into legacy designs that are in operation or about new items of equipment they are prototyping.
The board measures 138.5mm x 77mm, with a pair of Type-C power delivery ports. The first of these ports can cover both sink (receiving power) and source (providing power) roles. The second port serves only as a sink. These ports can support the 5V, 9V, 12V, 15V and 20V PDO profiles – as defined in revision 3.0 of the USB power delivery specification. These profiles can be configured by attachment of an external EEPROM memory, with LED indicators signifying which PDO profile is being used.
While the first port provides USB data transmission plus power delivery, the second port has power delivery capabilities. A power pass-through function has also been incorporated, with the input power on the second port being carried to the first port. External control of power delivery policy can be accomplished utilising the onboard I2C interface and the GPIO pins. These enable adjustment of the voltage regulator and the load switch.