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Gallium-Nitride Enables World’s Smallest Adapter for World’s Fastest Laptop

October 16, 2019 by Paul Shepard

Navitas Semiconductor announced its gallium-nitride (GaN) power technology enables the highest density ac-dc power adapter for the world's fastest laptop, -the Asus ProArt StudioBook One. An NVIDIA RTX™ Studio system, the ProArt One is the, first laptop to feature the NVIDIA Quadro RTX™ 6000 GPU and is based on NVIDIA's ACE reference architecture.

The 300W ac-dc adapter design, developed in collaboration with NVIDIA, exploits the high-speed power-conversion technology of Navitas' GaNFast power ICs to create a powerful, yet light-weight and small-size mobile charger.

"Creatives and other professionals demand the highest computing performance with extreme mobility," said Gene Sheridan, Navitas CEO. "Navitas' dedicated technologists worked alongside the NVIDIA engineering design team to address this challenge as part of the NVIDIA ACE reference design, delivering a 300W laptop adapter in half the size of traditional adapters."

"The high-speed performance of the Navitas GaNFast power ICs is a perfect match for the high-speed NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 GPU in the ProArt StudioBook One," said Gabriele Gorla, Director of Engineering at NVIDIA. "The result is an extraordinary accomplishment: a laptop with 16.3 TFLOPs of compute performance powered by a mobile adapter that fits in the palm of your hand."

The power adapter uses highly-integrated, speed-optimized, next-generation GaN semiconductor technology that replaces old, slow discrete silicon components, and enables the adapter to utilize high-frequency, soft-switching techniques in both power factor correction and downstream dc-dc stages.

High-frequency, high-efficiency switching shrinks the size, weight and cost of passive components and heatsinks. Navitas GaNFast power ICs enable a new generation of fast-charging mobile adapters for smartphones, tablets and laptops from 27W to 300W+.