What Is a Digital Potentiometer?

Digital potentiometer (Digital Potentiometer), also known as numerical control programmable resistor, is a new CMOS digital, analog mixed signal processing integrated circuit that replaces traditional mechanical potentiometers (analog potentiometers). The digital potentiometer is controlled by a digital input and produces an analog output. Depending on the digital potentiometer, the maximum tap current can be from a few hundred microamps to several milliamps. The digital potentiometer uses numerical control to adjust the resistance value. It has the obvious advantages of flexible use, high adjustment accuracy, no contact, low noise, non-contamination, anti-vibration, anti-interference, small size and long life. Mechanical potentiometer. ^[1]

Digital potentiometer

Digital potentiometer eliminates resistor substrate and

Digital potentiometers usually have

Produced by the principle of sensors, with good linearity, accuracy and temperature stability.

Using software to realize functions, can be customized according to changes in use requirements.

The working method is non-contact, avoiding the wear of traditional potentiometers, long life and high reliability.

Because the brush substrate in the traditional potentiometer is cancelled, the effective stroke reaches 360 °, and no blind zone measurement is realized.

There are many types of output signals (0-5V / 0-10V / 4-20mA / serial digital signal output), which is convenient for signal acquisition and processing.

The effective stroke and output signal can be changed by software to meet various special requirements.

Wide application range and flexible use.

There are two important differences between digital potentiometers and mechanical potentiometers: ^[1]

Digital potentiometers are rapidly spreading at home and abroad, and are widely used in testing instruments, PCs, mobile phones, home appliances, modern office equipment, industrial control, medical equipment and other fields. ^[1]

Digital potentiometer is a promising new type of electronic device, which can replace the traditional mechanical potentiometer in many fields. Its advantages are: high adjustment accuracy; no noise, extremely long working life; no mechanical wear; data can be read and written; configuration registers and data registers; multi-level volume storage function. It is widely used in instrumentation, computers and communication equipment, household appliances, medical care products, industrial control and other fields. Wherever it is necessary to use resistors for parameter adjustment and control, digital potentiometers can be used to form programmable analog circuits. However, in actual use, special attention should be paid to the resistance adjustment error of the digital potentiometer, due to the different factors affecting the error in different applications. Therefore, in actual application, it is best to use A / D conversion circuit to accurately measure it, and use a microcontroller to compensate it. ^[1]