What is Common Cathode LED Display? What advantages will it bring to the LED display?

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On 11/09/2024

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What is common cathode technology? What advantages will it bring to the LED display?

We first have a simple understanding of the common cathode drive architecture. The current LED displays in the industry, including P0.9/0.7 micro-pitch displays, mostly use the PM mode high-scan architecture. The AM display architecture has not yet been adopted. In the display panel, you can choose the industry’s conventional common anode display architecture, or near Common cathode display drive technology introduced in 2 years, so what is common cathode? Common cathode drive architecture? Common cathode LED display?

In fact, the “common cathode” in our common “common cathode drive architecture” and “common cathode LED display” refer to the common cathode power supply method.

Common cathode power supply mode

The common cathode power supply method is a technical solution based on the improvement of the common anode structure to achieve energy saving of the LED display. It refers to the common cathode method to drive the LED display and accurately distribute the current to the R, G, and B chips. The voltage and current first pass through the lamp beads and then to the negative electrode of the IC, reducing the forward voltage drop, and the internal resistance of the conduction becomes smaller, which can achieve the ideal energy-saving effect of reducing the heat of the screen, reducing the power consumption, and efficiently responding.

The difference between common cathode and common anode LED display drive architecture

Different driving methods:

Common cathode means that the current passes through the IC to the lamp bead, and then to the line tube grounding, so that the forward voltage drop becomes smaller and the internal resistance of conduction becomes smaller.
Common anode means that the current flows from the line tube of the PCB board to the lamp bead to supply power, and the forward voltage drop of the circuit becomes larger.

Different supply voltages:

Common cathode, the red chip voltage is required to be around 2.8V, and the blue and green chip voltages are required to be around 3.8V. This kind of power supply can achieve accurate power supply with less power consumption, and the heat generated by the LED display during operation is relatively low. .
Common anode, when the current is constant, the higher the voltage, the higher the power, and the greater the power consumption. At the same time, the LED display will also bring more heat during work.

What are the advantages of common cathode LED display drive architecture?

Independent power supply, energy saving:

The common cathode drive architecture adopts precise electronic control, based on the different photoelectric characteristics of the three primary colors of LED red, green, and blue, with a common cathode IC control system and independent private mode, to accurately allocate different voltages to the LED drive circuit to make the product power consumption relatively Similar products are more energy-saving and power-saving.

The color is real and more stable:

The common cathode driving method can accurately control the voltage, while reducing power consumption, it also reduces the heat generation, and the wavelength does not drift under continuous operation, and the true color is displayed stably.

Increased screen life:

Energy consumption is reduced, thereby greatly reducing the temperature rise of the system, effectively reducing the probability of LED damage, improving the stability and reliability of the entire display system, and extending the life of the system more effectively.