SMSC fan speed controller family scales thermal management

HAUPPAUGE, USA: SMSC announced its EMC230x fan speed controller family that consists of four new devices -– the EMC2301, EMC2302, EMC2303 and EMC2305.

The thermal management needs of larger systems are becoming more complicated and the effects of overlapping thermal zones are preventing fan controllers with integrated thermal management from functioning effectively.

To address this, SMSC has developed a new fan speed controller family delivering advanced thermal management in systems requiring as few as one fan or as many as five fans.

In large systems, such as servers, telecommunications systems and networked devices, thermal management is best managed by a central processor that is issuing individual drive signals to remote fans.

Whereas most fans in today’s market only provide +/-20 percent fan speed accuracy for a given drive signal, the EMC230x family is designed to receive drive signals from the central host and hold fan speeds to within one percent accuracy.

The EMC230x family of devices does this by actively monitoring the fan’s tachometer feedback and then adjusting the speed, as needed, to hit a given target. By accurately controlling fan speed, better acoustic and thermal performance can be maintained, yielding a more reliable and predictable design.

“Recognizing that thermal management for different system sizes often requires a variable solution, SMSC is bringing to market a new set of scalable fan controllers so these platforms can be optimized for both performance and cost,” said Mark Beadle, Vice President and General Manager of SMSC’s Analog Product Line.

When using multiple EMC230x devices within a system, fan speeds can be synchronized for optimal performance of a clock output. If the designer chooses not to synchronize clocks, this option can be utilized as a more accurate clock input to yield 0.5 percent fan speed accuracy.

On smaller systems, a designer may simply need to extend the architecture by one fan driver to obtain optimal performance. For these instances, use of the EMC2301 controller is ideal, since the fan drive instructions can be issued over the I2C bus to the EMC2301 to drive an additional fan.

For improved system reliability, all devices in the fan speed controller family can issue important system alerts. These include events such as stalled or aging fans, which help prevent system shut down and overheating. With this information, servicing and troubleshooting fan failures is faster and easier.

In addition, to minimize annoying fan noise associated with sudden changes, all devices come with configurable start-up and ramp rate controls. This feature alleviates some of the compute load associated with driving the fan directly.

In summary, all the flexibility offered by the EMC230x family scales to large multi-fan systems or can simply extend the number of fans in next generation systems.