Next-gen fixed-direction voltage level translators reduce power consumption and pin count

Nexperia has released a new family of next-generation fixed-direction voltage level translators ideal for use with some of the most commonly used push-pull data interfaces (including UART, SPI, and JTAG protocols) and GPIO. The NXU series of 4-bit, 2-bit, and 1-bit dual-supply buffers provide a smaller, higher performance and lower-cost level translation solution that simplifies communication between a host processor and peripheral I/O devices compared to existing designs in a wide range of consumer, industrial, automotive and enterprise applications.

Existing direction-controlled level translators generally need an additional GPIO pin for direction control, a necessity which increases device size while also adding to design complexity because it consumes I/O resources of the host processor. On the other hand, while auto-direction devices do not need a GPIO pin for direction control, they typically cannot provide the level of current drive required by many applications. Furthermore, they can sometimes exhibit non-deterministic I/O behaviour resulting from one-shot architectures that can be time-consuming to debug. Another shortcoming of direction-controlled and auto-direction devices is that they consume less power for power-sensitive implementations.

Devices in the company's NXU family have been developed to combine the parametric performance capabilities of direction-controlled translation devices (i.e., high data rate, high drive strength, and glitch-free power sequencing) with the lower pin-out and size advantages of auto-direction devices. The NXU translator devices consume remarkably less power (>2x reduction) compared to auto-direction devices (for comparable bit counts). They also have a wider supply voltage range (0.9V to 5.5V), making the devices appropriate for translating between any of the voltage nodes from 0.9V up to 5V. The devices also support faster data rates (up to 250Mbps) than other voltage translation solutions.

The NXU family of translators complements the company's existing portfolios of direction-controlled and auto-direction families of level translation devices by supplying level translation solutions for applications that need a combination of auto-direction and direction-controlled capabilities. Various data-direction and package configurations are provided for maximum flexibility, while automotive-qualified (AEC-Q100) variants are also obtainable in packages with side-wettable flanks to enable automated optical inspection.