SNAS264D April 2006 – February 2024 LM94
PRODUCTION DATA
The LM94 fan speed control method is optimized for fan noise reduction, fan power efficiency, fan reliability and minimum cost. The PWMx outputs can be filtered using an external switching regulator type output stage that provides 5V to 12V DC for fan power. A high PWM frequency is required to minimize the size and cost of the inductor and other components used in the output stage. The PWM outputs of the LM94 can operate up to 22.5 kHz with a variable step size depending on the fan control mode of operation. The LM94 supports LUT (Lookup Table) and PI (Proportional Integral) fan control methods. These methods can function interactively or independently as controlled by the PWM binding registers. Figure 6-4 shows the high level block diagram for these fan control methods. The mapping/binding of the temperature zones to the LUTs is completely independent of the PI loops. The temperature zones can be first independently bound to the LUTs and/or PI loops then each LUT or PI loop can be bound to either PWM Output. The LUT parameters are independent of the temperature zone binding. The PI loop controller is a proportional-integral feedback controller. It generates a 9-bit PWM duty cycle and uses temperature feedback from the processor thermal zones (Zones 1 and 2). The PWM output controls the airflow over the processors and thus the temperature of the processors is adjusted by the PI loop to maintain the hottest temperature reading between the values Tcontrol and Tcontrol - hysteresis. The LM94 supports 2 processors and each processor can have two thermal sub-zones. The hottest of each processor temperature is reported to the Zone selectors and PI loop inputs. Each processor has an independent Tcontrol setting.