ROHM Semiconductor Announces PICOLED RGB and Ambient Light Sensor
ROHM Semiconductor announces a new family of analog and digital Ambient Light Sensor (ALS) ICs. In Addition, ROHM has developed a series of ultra-compact 3-color LEDs for customers seeking to minimize size and energy consumption while intending to differentiate their products in an industry increasingly focused on the visual appearance.
Ambient Light Sensor:
ROHM Semiconductor announces a new family of analog and digital Ambient Light Sensor (ALS) ICs.These ALS ICs are ideal for a multitude of portable electronics products such as mobile phones, digital cameras, PDAs, notebooks a.o., requiring enhanced visibility, independent of a wide range of illumination conditions as well as optimized power consumption.
Featuring ROHM's proprietary trimming process and use of multiple photodiodes with different junction depths, they provide an accurate output with only little variation between various light sources. The spectral response of ROHM ALS ICs has been tailored to closely match that of the human eye for accurate light measurement. These features combine to provide uniform visibility for LCDs over a wide range of ambient light levels and sources – from incandescent or fluorescent light to full sunlight.
The ROHM ALS IC family includes the BH16xx (analog) / BH17xx (digital) series.
BH16xx analog series devices provide a linear current output proportional to luminous intensity ranging from 0 to 100,000 lux. These units feature ROHM's unique three-level gain selection providing exceptional design flexibility in matching power consumption to the specific application requirements.
The BH17xx series of digital devices integrate a 16-bit analog-to-digital converter that produces 1 lx resolution over a range of 0 to 65,000 lx. The devices' I2C output is designed for direct connection to a microcontroller or baseband processor. Two measurement resolution levels are provided allowing design trade-offs between sampling time and performance. For example, with high-resolution sampling, optical noise such as fluorescent lamp flicker can be filtered out. Low resolution provides a shorter sampling time for applications such as GPS systems where the light level changes are dynamic.
Key advantages of the ROHM ALS Series include:
• Higher light-sensing accuracy (±15% compared to competitive devices that range from ±30% to ±55%)
• More stable ambient light detection (±10% maximum difference regardless of light source, compared to competitive products with up to 4:1 variations)
• Wide operating temperature range (-40ºC to 85ºC)
• Wide light detection range (up to 100,000 lux)
• Small, surface-mount packaging
• RoHS-compliant and halogen-free package
• Optimized power consumption (e.g. reducing up to 30% of the power in standby mode)
Günter Richard said: "Adjusting the LED backlight intensity to compensate for varying light levels can save 50% or more of the total power required to operate many LCD-equipped devices. The ROHM family of analog and digital ALS ICs offers an exceptional range of performance capabilities for the full scale of LED backlighting applications."
ROHM’s PICOLED RGB:
Downsizing of applications and electronic devices naturally leads to downsizing of electronic parts and more than ever, the industry is looking for these parts in order to meet this request for future designs.
ROHM has developed a series of ultra-compact 3-color LEDs for customers seeking to minimize size and energy consumption while intending to differentiate their products in an industry increasingly focused on the visual appearance. The PICOLEDTM-RGB family provides the ideal solution for sets requiring full-color capability in the smallest form factor possible such as color indicator displays in mobile phones, illumination lighting for handheld gaming devices, and compact, full-color dot matrix displays.
Two package configurations are available: the industry's smallest, thinnest top view type (4-pin: 1.0×1.0×0.2mm, 6-pin: 1.5×1.0×0.2mm) and the thinnest side view type in the industry (0.5mm thick).
About ROHM:
ROHM - a name which stands for quality in the electronic industry with over 20,000 employees who produce a wide range of internationally marketable products, such as integrated circuits, diodes, transistors, resistors, tantal capacitors, display units, and special designs, in state-of-the-art manufacturing plants in Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines and China. ROHM in Europe serves the EMEA region ( Europe and Middle East ) with a staff of 160 in our sales locations all over Europe. For further information please contact www.rohmeurope.com
