SiLabs unveils ‘industry's highest performance’ isolators

SiLabs' new 5kV Si84xx digital isolators are designed to provide a smaller, faster and more reliable isolation solution than optocouplers without the wear-out mechanisms, aging effects or temperature dependencies that plague optocoupler-based designs. Accirding to SiLabs, they offer best-in-class electromagnetic immunity among digital isolation solutions. The 5kV Si84xx digital isolators target industrial automation and drives, motor control and medical device applications that require robust operation and high levels of protection. The Si84xx digital isolators are also suitable for systems powered from 220V mains supplies such as isolated ac/dc and dc/dc power supplies, solar power inverters, lighting systems, data communications, and test and measurement equipment. The digital isolators are designed to minimise data errors while enabling lower emissions than transformer-based isolation designs. "With industry leading electromagnetic field immunity and best-in-class rf emissions, the Si84xx digital isolators offer bullet-proof performance in the harshest operating environments," said Mark Thompson, vice president of Embedded Mixed-Signal products at Silicon Labs. "The new 5kV devices enable customers to replace their optocoupler-based designs with a more reliable, high performance digital isolation solution." According to SiLabs, the Si84xx isolators offer the industry's highest data rate at 150Mbps across the widest temperature range (-40 to 125^°C), making them suitable to replace optocouplers in a wide variety of industrial applications. In addition to offering new 5kV devices, the Si84xx family includes 2-channel options with industry-standard pin-outs that are compatible with other widely used digital isolator products. Samples and production quantities of the 5kV Si84xx digital isolators are available now.