Equipment for driving plasma display screen and its method

Abstract

Disclosed is an apparatus and method for driving a plasma display panel (PDP) where a switch device can perform zero voltage switching in driving the PDP. The apparatus for driving the PDP includes a sustain-discharge unit including first through fourth switches respectively connected to both ends of a panel capacitor between a power source and ground, for sustaining a panel capacitor terminal voltage to be at a first or a second sustain-discharge voltage; a first charge and discharge unit including a first inductor, for increasing the voltage of the panel capacitor to the first sustain-discharge voltage and switching a first switch in a state of a zero voltage by half of a resonance current generated by the first inductor; and a second charge and discharge unit including a second inductor, for decreasing the voltage of the panel capacitor to the second sustain-discharge voltage and switching a third switch in a state of the zero voltage by half of a resonance current generated by the second inductor.

Description

technical field [0001] The present invention relates to an apparatus and method for driving a plasma display panel (PDP), and more particularly, to an apparatus and method for driving a PDP whose switching means can perform zero-voltage switching when driving the PDP. Background technique [0002] In general, a PDP is a flat panel display for displaying characters or images using plasma generated by gas discharge. The number of pixels distributed in a matrix can range from hundreds of thousands to over millions depending on the size of the PDP. PDPs are classified into direct current (DC) PDPs and alternating current (AC) PAPs according to waveforms of applied driving voltages and structures of discharge cells. [0003] The most notable difference between DC PDP and AC PDP is that in DC PDP, since the electrodes are exposed to the discharge space, current flows directly into the discharge space when a voltage is applied in the DC PDP. Therefore, a current limiting resistor...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

[0020] In the conventional sustaining discharge circuit 10, because the number of switches of the power recovery circuit of the whole sustaining discharging circuit (comprising the X and Y electrode drive circuits) is four, the structure of the working driver is complicated

Difficult to implement a low-cost sustaining discharge drive circuit due to the use of expensive switching devices

[0021] In addition, due to the parasitic elements of the driving circuit such as the parasitic resistance of the inductor, the parasitic resistance of the capacitor and the display screen, and the conduction resistance of the switch, the switching of the circuit cannot achieve zero-voltage switching operation.

As a result, switching losses increase significantly when the switch is turned on

[0022] Also, when the sustain pulse is just after the start of light emission and the power recovery capacitor C C not charged to voltage V S In the beginning of half of the cases, a huge inrush current will be generated

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