
PRODUCT SPECIFICATION
FAN2514/FAN2515
4
REV. 1.0.8 2/14/03
Thermal Characteristics
The FAN2514/15 is designed to supply 200mA at the 
specified output voltage with an operating die (junction) 
temperature of up to 125°C. Once the power dissipation and 
thermal resistance is known, the maximum junction 
temperature of the device can be calculated. While the power 
dissipation is calculated from known electrical parameters, 
the thermal resistance is a result of the thermal characteris-
tics of the compact SOT23-5 surface-mount package and the 
surrounding PC Board copper to which it is mounted.
The power dissipation is equal to the product of the input-to-
output voltage differential and the output current plus the 
ground current multiplied by the input voltage, or:
The ground pin current I
provided in the Electrical Characteristics section.
GND
 can be found in the charts 
The relationship describing the thermal behavior of the 
package is:
where T
ture of the die, which is 125°C, and T
ing temperature. 
θ
JA
board layout and can be empirically obtained. While the 
(junction-to-case) of the SOT23-5 package is specified at 
130°C /W, the 
θ
JA
 of the minimum PWB footprint will be at 
least 235°C /W. This can be improved upon by providing a 
heat sink of surrounding copper ground on the PWB. 
Depending on the size of the copper area, the resulting 
can range from approximately 180°C /W for one square inch 
to nearly 130°C /W for 4 square inches. The addition of 
backside copper with through-holes, stiffeners, and other 
enhancements can also aid in reducing this value. The heat 
contributed by the dissipation of other devices located 
nearby must be included in design considerations.
J(max)
 is the maximum allowable junction tempera-
A
 is the ambient operat-
 is dependent on the surrounding PC 
θ
JC
θ
JA
Once the limiting parameters in these two relationships have 
been determined, the design can be modified to ensure that 
the device remains within specified operating conditions. 
If overload conditions are not considered, it is possible for 
the device to enter a thermal cycling loop, in which the 
circuit enters a shutdown condition, cools, re-enables, and 
then again overheats and shuts down repeatedly due to an 
unmanaged fault condition. 
Operation of Adjustable Version
The adjustable version of the FAN2514/15 includes an input 
pin ADJ which allows the user to select an output voltage 
ranging from 1.8V to near V
IN
divider. The voltage V
ADJ
 presented to the ADJ pin is fed to 
the onboard error amplifier which adjusts the output voltage 
until V
ADJ
 is equal to the onboard bandgap reference voltage 
of 1.3V(typ). The equation is:
, using an external resistor 
The total value of the resistor chain should not exceed 
250K
 total to keep the error amplifier biased during 
no-load conditions. Programming output voltages very near 
V
IN
 need to allow for the magnitude and variation of the 
dropout voltage V
DO
 over load, supply, and temperature 
variations. Note that the low-leakage FET input to the 
CMOS Error Amplifier induces no bias current error to the 
calculation.
General PWB Layout Considerations
To achieve the full performance of the device, careful circuit 
layout and grounding technique must be observed. Establish-
ing a small local ground, to which the GND pin, the output 
and bypass capacitors are connected, is recommended, while 
the input capacitor should be grounded to the main ground 
plane. The quiet local ground is then routed back to the main 
ground plane using feedthrough vias. In general, the high-
frequency compensation components (input, bypass, and 
output capacitors) should be located as close to the device as 
possible. The proximity of the output capacitor is especially 
important to achieve optimal noise compensation from the 
onboard error amplifier, especially during high load condi-
tions. A large copper area in the local ground will provide the 
heat sinking discussed above when high power dissipation 
significantly increases the temperature of the device. 
Component-side copper provides significantly better thermal 
performance for this surface-mount device, compared to that 
obtained when using only copper planes on the underside. 
P
D
V
IN
V
OUT
–
(
)
I
OUT
V
IN
I
GND
+
=
P
D max
)
T
-------------------------------
T
A
–
JA
=
V
OUT
1.3V
1
R
lower
R
+
×
=