Электронные усилители: принципы и применение.

Electronic device/component that increases the strength of a signal
electronic amplifiers

An amplifier, electronic amplifier or (informally) amp is an electronic device that can increase the magnitude of a signal (a time varying voltage or current). It is a two port electronic circuit that uses electric power from a power supply to increase the amplitude (magnitude of the voltage or current) of a signal applied to its input terminals, producing a proportionally greater amplitude signal at its output. The amount of amplification provided by an amplifier is measured by its gain: the ratio of output voltage, current, or power to input. An amplifier is defined as a circuit that has a power gain greater than one. An amplifier can be either a separate piece of equipment or an electrical circuit contained within another device. Amplification is fundamental to modern electronics, and amplifiers are widely used in almost all electronic equipment. Amplifiers can be categorized in different ways. One is by the frequency of the electronic signal being amplified. For example, audio amplifiers amplify signals in the audio (sound) range of less than 20 kHz, RF amplifiers amplify frequencies in the radio frequency range between 20 kHz and 300 GHz, and servo amplifiers and instrumentation amplifiers may work with very low frequencies down to direct current. Amplifiers can also be categorized by their physical placement in the signal chain; a preamplifier may precede other signal processing stages, for example, while a power amplifier is usually used after other amplifier stages to provide enough output power for the final use of the signal. The first practical electrical device which could amplify was the triode vacuum tube, invented in 1906 by Lee De Forest, which led to the first amplifiers around 1912. Today most amplifiers use transistors.

The first practical prominent device that could amplify was the triode vacuum tube, invented in 1906 by Lee De Forest, which led to the first amplifiers around 1912. Vacuum tubes were used in almost all amplifiers until the 1960s–1970s when transistors replaced them. Today, most amplifiers use transistors, but vacuum tubes continue to be used in some applications. The development of audio communication technology in form of the telephone, first patented in 1876, created the need to increase the amplitude of electrical signals to extend the transmission of signals over increasingly long distances. In telegraphy, this problem had been solved with intermediate devices at stations that replenished the dissipated energy by operating a signal recorder and transmitter back to back, forming a relay, so that a local energy source at each intermediate station powered the next leg of transmission. For duplex transmission, i. e. sending and receiving in both directions, bi directional relay repeaters were developed starting with the work of C. F. Varley for telegraphic transmission. Duplex transmission was essential for telephony and the problem was not satisfactorily solved until 1904, when H. E. Shreeve of the American Telephone and Telegraph Company improved existing attempts at constructing a telephone repeater consisting of back to back carbon granule transmitter and electrodynamic receiver pairs. The Shreeve repeater was first tested on a line between Boston and Amesbury, MA, and more refined devices remained in service for some time. After the turn of the century it was found that negative resistance mercury lamps could amplify, and were also tried in repeaters, with little success. The development of thermionic valves which began around 1902, provided an entirely electronic method of amplifying signals. The first practical version of such devices was the Audion triode, invented in 1906 by Lee De Forest, which led to the first amplifiers around 1912. The terms amplifier and amplification, derived from the Latin amplificare, (to enlarge or expand), were first used for this new capability around 1915 when triodes became widespread. It made possible long distance telephone lines, public address systems, radio broadcasting, talking motion pictures, practical audio recording, radar, television, and the first computers. For 50 years virtually all consumer electronic devices used vacuum tubes. Early tube amplifiers often had positive feedback (regeneration), which could increase gain but also make the amplifier unstable and prone to oscillation. Much of the mathematical theory of amplifiers was developed at Bell Telephone Laboratories during the 1920s to 1940s. Distortion levels in early amplifiers were high, usually around 5%, until 1934, when Harold Black developed negative feedback; this allowed the distortion levels to be greatly reduced, at the cost of lower gain. Other advances in the theory of amplification were made by Harry Nyquist and Hendrik Wade Bode. The vacuum tube was virtually the only amplifying device, other than specialized power devices such as the magnetic amplifier and amplidyne, for 40 years. Power control circuitry used magnetic amplifiers until the latter half of the twentieth century when power semiconductor devices became more economical, with higher operating speeds. The old Shreeve electroacoustic carbon repeaters were used in adjustable amplifiers in telephone subscriber sets for the hearing impaired until the transistor provided smaller and higher quality amplifiers in the 1950s.

The first working transistor was a point contact transistor invented by John Bardeen and Walter Brattain in 1947 at Bell Labs, where William Shockley later invented the bipolar junction transistor (BJT) in 1948. They were followed by the invention of the metal–oxide–semiconductor field effect transistor (MOSFET) by Mohamed M. Atalla and Dawon Kahng at Bell Labs in 1959. Due to MOSFET scaling, the ability to scale down to increasingly small sizes, the MOSFET has since become the most widely used amplifier. The replacement of bulky electron tubes with transistors during the 1960s and 1970s created a revolution in electronics, making possible a large class of portable electronic devices, such as the transistor radio developed in 1954. Today, use of vacuum tubes is limited to some high power applications, such as radio transmitters, as well as some musical instrument and high end audiophile amplifiers. Beginning in the 1970s, more and more transistors were connected on a single chip thereby creating higher scales of integration (such as small scale, medium scale and large scale integration) in integrated circuits. Many amplifiers commercially available today are based on integrated circuits. For special purposes, other active elements have been used. For example, in the early days of the satellite communication, parametric amplifiers were used. The core circuit was a diode whose capacitance was changed by an RF signal created locally. Under certain conditions, this RF signal provided energy that was modulated by the extremely weak satellite signal received at the earth station. Advances in digital electronics since the late 20th century provided new alternatives to the conventional linear gain amplifiers by using digital switching to vary the pulse shape of fixed amplitude signals, resulting in devices such as the Class D amplifier.

A power amplifier is an amplifier designed primarily to increase the power available to a load. In practice, amplifier power gain depends on the source and load impedances, as well as the inherent voltage and current gain. A radio frequency (RF) amplifier design typically optimizes impedances for power transfer, while audio and instrumentation amplifier designs normally optimize input and output impedance for least loading and highest signal integrity. An amplifier that is said to have a gain of 20 dB might have a voltage gain of 20 dB and an available power gain of much more than 20 dB (power ratio of 100)—yet actually deliver a much lower power gain if, for example, the input is from a 600 Ω microphone and the output connects to a 47 kΩ input socket for a power amplifier. In general, the power amplifier is the last 'amplifier' or actual circuit in a signal chain (the output stage) and is the amplifier stage that requires attention to power efficiency. Efficiency considerations lead to the various classes of power amplifiers based on the biasing of the output transistors or tubes: see power amplifier classes below. Audio power amplifiers are typically used to drive loudspeakers. They will often have two output channels and deliver equal power to each. An RF power amplifier is found in radio transmitter final stages. A Servo motor controller: amplifies a control voltage to adjust the speed of a motor, or the position of a motorized system.

An operational amplifier is an amplifier circuit which typically has very high open loop gain and differential inputs. Op amps have become very widely used as standardized "gain blocks" in circuits due to their versatility; their gain, bandwidth and other characteristics can be controlled by feedback through an external circuit. Though the term today commonly applies to integrated circuits, the original operational amplifier design used valves, and later designs used discrete transistor circuits. A fully differential amplifier is similar to the operational amplifier, but also has differential outputs. These are usually constructed using BJTs or FETs.

These use balanced transmission lines to separate individual single stage amplifiers, the outputs of which are summed by the same transmission line. The transmission line is a balanced type with the input at one end and on one side only of the balanced transmission line and the output at the opposite end is also the opposite side of the balanced transmission line. The gain of each stage adds linearly to the output rather than multiplies one on the other as in a cascade configuration. This allows a higher bandwidth to be achieved than could otherwise be realised even with the same gain stage elements.

These nonlinear amplifiers have much higher efficiencies than linear amps, and are used where the power saving justifies the extra complexity. Class D amplifiers are the main example of this type of amplification.

Negative Resistance Amplifier is a type of Regenerative Amplifier that can use the feedback between the transistor's source and gate to transform a capacitive impedance on the transistor's source to a negative resistance on its gate. Compared to other types of amplifiers, this "negative resistance amplifier" will require only a tiny amount of power to achieve very high gain, maintaining a good noise figure at the same time.

Video amplifiers are designed to process video signals and have varying bandwidths depending on whether the video signal is for SDTV, EDTV, HDTV 720p or 1080i/p etc The specification of the bandwidth itself depends on what kind of filter is used—and at which point (−1 dB or −3 dB for example) the bandwidth is measured. Certain requirements for step response and overshoot are necessary for an acceptable TV image.

Traveling wave tube amplifiers (TWTAs) are used for high power amplification at low microwave frequencies. They typically can amplify across a broad spectrum of frequencies; however, they are usually not as tunable as klystrons. Klystrons are specialized linear beam vacuum devices, designed to provide high power, widely tunable amplification of millimetre and sub millimetre waves. Klystrons are designed for large scale operations and despite having a narrower bandwidth than TWTAs, they have the advantage of coherently amplifying a reference signal so its output may be precisely controlled in amplitude, frequency and phase. Solid state devices such as silicon short channel MOSFETs like double diffused metal–oxide–semiconductor (DMOS) FETs, GaAs FETs, SiGe and GaAs heterojunction bipolar transistors/HBTs, HEMTs, IMPATT diodes, and others, are used especially at lower microwave frequencies and power levels on the order of watts specifically in applications like portable RF terminals/cell phones and access points where size and efficiency are the drivers. New materials like gallium nitride (GaN) or GaN on silicon or on silicon carbide/SiC are emerging in HEMT transistors and applications where improved efficiency, wide bandwidth, operation roughly from few to few tens of GHz with output power of few Watts to few hundred of Watts are needed. Depending on the amplifier specifications and size requirements microwave amplifiers can be realised as monolithically integrated, integrated as modules or based on discrete parts or any combination of those. The maser is a non electronic microwave amplifier.

Instrument amplifiers are a range of audio power amplifiers used to increase the sound level of musical instruments, for example guitars, during performances. Amplifiers' tone mainly come from the order and amount in which it applies EQ and distortion

One set of classifications for amplifiers is based on which device terminal is common to both the input and the output circuit. In the case of bipolar junction transistors, the three classes are common emitter, common base, and common collector. For field effect transistors, the corresponding configurations are common source, common gate, and common drain; for vacuum tubes, common cathode, common grid, and common plate. The common emitter (or common source, common cathode, etc.) is most often configured to provide amplification of a voltage applied between base and emitter, and the output signal taken between collector and emitter is inverted, relative to the input. The common collector arrangement applies the input voltage between base and collector, and to take the output voltage between emitter and collector. This causes negative feedback, and the output voltage tends to follow the input voltage. This arrangement is also used as the input presents a high impedance and does not load the signal source, though the voltage amplification is less than one. The common collector circuit is, therefore, better known as an emitter follower, source follower, or cathode follower.

An amplifier whose output exhibits no feedback to its input side is described as 'unilateral'. The input impedance of a unilateral amplifier is independent of load, and output impedance is independent of signal source impedance. An amplifier that uses feedback to connect part of the output back to the input is a bilateral amplifier. Bilateral amplifier input impedance depends on the load, and output impedance on the signal source impedance. All amplifiers are bilateral to some degree; however they may often be modeled as unilateral under operating conditions where feedback is small enough to neglect for most purposes, simplifying analysis (see the common base article for an example).

Another way to classify amplifiers is by the phase relationship of the input signal to the output signal. An 'inverting' amplifier produces an output 180 degrees out of phase with the input signal (that is, a polarity inversion or mirror image of the input as seen on an oscilloscope). A 'non inverting' amplifier maintains the phase of the input signal waveforms. An emitter follower is a type of non inverting amplifier, indicating that the signal at the emitter of a transistor is following (that is, matching with unity gain but perhaps an offset) the input signal. Voltage follower is also non inverting type of amplifier having unity gain. This description can apply to a single stage of an amplifier, or to a complete amplifier system.

Other amplifiers may be classified by their function or output characteristics. These functional descriptions usually apply to complete amplifier systems or sub systems and rarely to individual stages. A servo amplifier indicates an integrated feedback loop to actively control the output at some desired level. A DC servo indicates use at frequencies down to DC levels, where the rapid fluctuations of an audio or RF signal do not occur. These are often used in mechanical actuators, or devices such as DC motors that must maintain a constant speed or torque. An AC servo amp. can do this for some AC motors. A linear amplifier responds to different frequency components independently, and does not generate harmonic distortion or intermodulation distortion. No amplifier can provide perfect linearity (even the most linear amplifier has some nonlinearities, since the amplifying devices—transistors or vacuum tubes—follow nonlinear power laws such as square laws and rely on circuitry techniques to reduce those effects). A nonlinear amplifier generates significant distortion and so changes the harmonic content; there are situations where this is useful. Amplifier circuits intentionally providing a non linear transfer function include:
a device like a silicon controlled rectifier or a transistor used as a switch may be employed to turn either fully on or off a load such as a lamp based on a threshold in a continuously variable input. a non linear amplifier in an analog computer or true RMS converter for example can provide a special transfer function, such as logarithmic or square law. a Class C RF amplifier may be chosen because it can be very efficient—but is non linear. Following such an amplifier with a so called tank tuned circuit can reduce unwanted harmonics (distortion) sufficiently to make it useful in transmitters, or some desired harmonic may be selected by setting the resonant frequency of the tuned circuit to a higher frequency rather than fundamental frequency in frequency multiplier circuits. Automatic gain control circuits require an amplifier's gain be controlled by the time averaged amplitude so that the output amplitude varies little when weak stations are being received. The non linearities are assumed arranged so the relatively small signal amplitude suffers from little distortion (cross channel interference or intermodulation) yet is still modulated by the relatively large gain control DC voltage. AM detector circuits that use amplification such as anode bend detectors, precision rectifiers and infinite impedance detectors (so excluding unamplified detectors such as cat's whisker detectors), as well as peak detector circuits, rely on changes in amplification based on the signal's instantaneous amplitude to derive a direct current from an alternating current input. Operational amplifier comparator and detector circuits. A wideband amplifier has a precise amplification factor over a wide frequency range, and is often used to boost signals for relay in communications systems. A narrowband amp amplifies a specific narrow range of frequencies, to the exclusion of other frequencies. An RF amplifier amplifies signals in the radio frequency range of the electromagnetic spectrum, and is often used to increase the sensitivity of a receiver or the output power of a transmitter. An audio amplifier amplifies audio frequencies. This category subdivides into small signal amplification, and power amps that are optimised to driving speakers, sometimes with multiple amps grouped together as separate or bridgeable channels to accommodate different audio reproduction requirements. Frequently used terms within audio amplifiers include:
Preamplifier (preamp. ), which may include a phono preamp with RIAA equalization, or tape head preamps with CCIR equalisation filters. They may include filters or tone control circuitry. Power amplifier (normally drives loudspeakers), headphone amplifiers, and public address amplifiers. Stereo amplifiers imply two channels of output (left and right), though the term simply means "solid" sound (referring to three dimensional)—so quadraphonic stereo was used for amplifiers with four channels. 5.1 and 7.1 systems refer to Home theatre systems with 5 or 7 normal spatial channels, plus a subwoofer channel. Buffer amplifiers, which may include emitter followers, provide a high impedance input for a device (perhaps another amplifier, or perhaps an energy hungry load such as lights) that would otherwise draw too much current from the source. Line drivers are a type of buffer that feeds long or interference prone interconnect cables, possibly with differential outputs through twisted pair cables.

Amplifiers are sometimes classified by the coupling method of the signal at the input, output, or between stages. Different types of these include:
Resistive capacitive (RC) coupled amplifier, using a network of resistors and capacitors By design these amplifiers cannot amplify DC signals as the capacitors block the DC component of the input signal. RC coupled amplifiers were used very often in circuits with vacuum tubes or discrete transistors. In the days of the integrated circuit a few more transistors on a chip are much cheaper and smaller than a capacitor. Inductive capacitive (LC) coupled amplifier, using a network of inductors and capacitors This kind of amplifier is most often used in selective radio frequency circuits. Transformer coupled amplifier, using a transformer to match impedances or to decouple parts of the circuits Quite often LC coupled and transformer coupled amplifiers cannot be distinguished as a transformer is some kind of inductor. Direct coupled amplifier, using no impedance and bias matching components This class of amplifier was very uncommon in the vacuum tube days when the anode (output) voltage was at greater than several hundred volts and the grid (input) voltage at a few volts minus. So they were used only if the gain was specified down to DC (e. g., in an oscilloscope). In the context of modern electronics developers are encouraged to use directly coupled amplifiers whenever possible. In FET and CMOS technologies direct coupling is dominant since gates of MOSFETs theoretically pass no current through themselves. Therefore, DC component of the input signals is automatically filtered.

Depending on the frequency range and other properties amplifiers are designed according to different principles. Frequency ranges down to DC are used only when this property is needed. Amplifiers for direct current signals are vulnerable to minor variations in the properties of components with time. Special methods, such as chopper stabilized amplifiers are used to prevent objectionable drift in the amplifier's properties for DC. "DC blocking" capacitors can be added to remove DC and sub sonic frequencies from audio amplifiers. Depending on the frequency range specified different design principles must be used. Up to the MHz range only "discrete" properties need be considered; e. g., a terminal has an input impedance. As soon as any connection within the circuit gets longer than perhaps 1% of the wavelength of the highest specified frequency (e. g., at 100 MHz the wavelength is 3 m, so the critical connection length is approx. 3 cm) design properties radically change. For example, a specified length and width of a PCB trace can be used as a selective or impedance matching entity. Above a few hundred MHz, it gets difficult to use discrete elements, especially inductors. In most cases, PCB traces of very closely defined shapes are used instead (stripline techniques). The frequency range handled by an amplifier might be specified in terms of bandwidth (normally implying a response that is 3 dB down when the frequency reaches the specified bandwidth), or by specifying a frequency response that is within a certain number of decibels between a lower and an upper frequency (e. g. "20 Hz to 20 kHz plus or minus 1 dB").

Power amplifier circuits (output stages) are classified as A, B, AB and C for analog designs—and class D and E for switching designs. The power amplifier classes are based on the proportion of each input cycle (conduction angle) during which an amplifying device passes current. The image of the conduction angle derives from amplifying a sinusoidal signal. If the device is always on, the conducting angle is 360°. If it is on for only half of each cycle, the angle is 180°. The angle of flow is closely related to the amplifier power efficiency.

The practical amplifier circuit shown above could be the basis for a moderate power audio amplifier. It features a typical (though substantially simplified) design as found in modern amplifiers, with a class AB push–pull output stage, and uses some overall negative feedback. Bipolar transistors are shown, but this design would also be realizable with FETs or valves. The input signal is coupled through capacitor C1 to the base of transistor Q1. The capacitor allows the AC signal to pass, but blocks the DC bias voltage established by resistors R1 and R2 so that any preceding circuit is not affected by it. Q1 and Q2 form a differential amplifier (an amplifier that multiplies the difference between two inputs by some constant), in an arrangement known as a long tailed pair. This arrangement is used to conveniently allow the use of negative feedback, which is fed from the output to Q2 via R7 and R8. The negative feedback into the difference amplifier allows the amplifier to compare the input to the actual output. The amplified signal from Q1 is directly fed to the second stage, Q3, which is a common emitter stage that provides further amplification of the signal and the DC bias for the output stages, Q4 and Q5. R6 provides the load for Q3 (a better design would probably use some form of active load here, such as a constant current sink). So far, all of the amplifier is operating in class A. The output pair are arranged in class AB push–pull, also called a complementary pair. They provide the majority of the current amplification (while consuming low quiescent current) and directly drive the load, connected via DC blocking capacitor C2. The diodes D1 and D2 provide a small amount of constant voltage bias for the output pair, just biasing them into the conducting state so that crossover distortion is minimized. That is, the diodes push the output stage firmly into class AB mode (assuming that the base emitter drop of the output transistors is reduced by heat dissipation). This design is simple, but a good basis for a practical design because it automatically stabilises its operating point, since feedback internally operates from DC up through the audio range and beyond. Further circuit elements would probably be found in a real design that would roll off the frequency response above the needed range to prevent the possibility of unwanted oscillation. Also, the use of fixed diode bias as shown here can cause problems if the diodes are not both electrically and thermally matched to the output transistors if the output transistors turn on too much, they can easily overheat and destroy themselves, as the full current from the power supply is not limited at this stage. A common solution to help stabilise the output devices is to include some emitter resistors, typically one ohm or so. Calculating the values of the circuit's resistors and capacitors is done based on the components employed and the intended use of the amp.

Any real amplifier is an imperfect realization of an ideal amplifier. An important limitation of a real amplifier is that the output it generates is ultimately limited by the power available from the power supply. An amplifier saturates and clips the output if the input signal becomes too large for the amplifier to reproduce or exceeds operational limits for the device. The power supply may influence the output, so must be considered in the design. The power output from an amplifier cannot exceed its input power. The amplifier circuit has an "open loop" performance. This is described by various parameters (gain, slew rate, output impedance, distortion, bandwidth, signal to noise ratio, etc.). Many modern amplifiers use negative feedback techniques to hold the gain at the desired value and reduce distortion. Negative loop feedback has the intended effect of lowering the output impedance and thereby increasing electrical damping of loudspeaker motion at and near the resonance frequency of the speaker. When assessing rated amplifier power output, it is useful to consider the applied load, the signal type (e. g., speech or music), required power output duration (i. e., short time or continuous), and required dynamic range (e. g., recorded or live audio). In high powered audio applications that require long cables to the load (e. g., cinemas and shopping centres) it may be more efficient to connect to the load at line output voltage, with matching transformers at source and loads. This avoids long runs of heavy speaker cables. To prevent instability or overheating requires care to ensure solid state amplifiers are adequately loaded. Most have a rated minimum load impedance. All amplifiers generate heat through electrical losses. The amplifier must dissipate this heat via convection or forced air cooling. Heat can damage or reduce electronic component service life. Designers and installers must also consider heating effects on adjacent equipment. Different power supply types result in many different methods of bias. Bias is a technique by which active devices are set to operate in a particular region, or by which the DC component of the output signal is set to the midpoint between the maximum voltages available from the power supply. Most amplifiers use several devices at each stage; they are typically matched in specifications except for polarity. Matched inverted polarity devices are called complementary pairs. Class A amplifiers generally use only one device, unless the power supply is set to provide both positive and negative voltages, in which case a dual device symmetrical design may be used. Class C amplifiers, by definition, use a single polarity supply. Amplifiers often have multiple stages in cascade to increase gain. Each stage of these designs may be a different type of amp to suit the needs of that stage. For instance, the first stage might be a class A stage, feeding a class AB push–pull second stage, which then drives a class G final output stage, taking advantage of the strengths of each type, while minimizing their weaknesses.