New Jim Williams article on HV power supplies

Hi Paul Rako, Jim is a great Engineer. Reading anything he writes is a joy and highly educative.Apart from 14 Tek scopes, it would be interesting to know what else (like a mechanical calculator)he has in his basement. Is it possible for you to give me JIM's email id or pass on my request to him for Royer's articles on his converters? I could not read any Royer's article. Thanks.

review reports

Agreed; a classic paper for the permanent library. I had to design an HT bias circuit for an avalanche photodiode not so long ago, and after some deliberation I chose the resonant Royer architecture. Some research later, and I find that the Royer converter has been around since the ?50s, but almost every article of use pointed back to Jim Williams. There?s a reason for this ? back in ?91 JW had just started investigating more efficient methods of driving the CCFL backlights for LCDs, when Apple found they had a burning need for a more efficient LCD backlight driver, and contacted him at Linear Tech. A seed of inspiration from a tube-based power supply from an old Tektronix ?scope and then a whole load of hard work and world-class engineering led to the circuits described in this paper. JW?s converter architecture became the circuit of choice for LCD users, and just about every LCD TV and laptop screen you?ll see will use one of his. The full fascinating story of the development of this circuit is told in the book ?The Art and Science of Analog Circuit Design? (ISBN 0-7506-7062-2), also edited by JW. It?s an excellent book all round, and JW?s converter chapter was the highlight for me. A necessary read if you?re designing Royer converters, or just wish to maintain an edge in the analog field (for the record, it?s an EDN book, but I have no connection with EDN aside from the odd comment). The Linear Technology notes on the converter are excellent. Another good paper from Zetex goes into rare detail on Royer transistor requirements (they?re a bit special): www.zetex.com/3.0/appnotes/apps/an14.pdf