摘要 |
A circuit and a method are disclosed which offer a solution for integrating a power-on-reset circuit that is realizable in a small space, consumes very little power, and works for practically any rate of rise of the power supply. These goals have been achieved by detecting, in a first section of the circuit, when the supply voltage reaches the threshold voltage VTP of a p-channel transistor, and activates power-on-reset by forcing that signal to logical zero (active). This first section detects next when the supply voltage reaches 2VTP and signals to a second section of the circuit to start charging a capacitor. The charging rate of the capacitor is controlled in such a way that its voltage lags behind the supply voltage, so that if the rise of the supply voltage is very fast, the duration TD of power-on-reset is long enough to insure complete resetting of the circuits it serves, such as digital memory elements, digital registers etc. A third section of the circuit monitors the voltage of the capacitor and when this capacitor voltage has reached a certain predetermined percentage of the supply voltage, this third section terminates power-on-reset by switching that signal to logical one (inactive).
|