COMPANDER FOR POWER CONTROL IN A BALLAST

摘要

A system and method for the dynamic power control of a ballast, wherein a compander (10) is used to reduce dynamic input range requirements of an analog-to-digital converter (ADC) (18) in power systems having dynamic signal ranges that are several orders of magnitude smaller than the largest signal being sampled. The present invention compresses an analog power signal (12) and then digitizes and expands the signal to attain a digitized signal having an amplitude identical to the analog signal (12), thereby providing a power control system that is less expensive and less complicated than conventional power systems. The present invention can use algorithms to calculate both the expansion values and correction values required for a power control circuit to adjust an output power level toward a desired value.