Quote:
Originally Posted by DIYman
I hope someone can assist with knowledge of electronics.
I am getting a power supply built to run a CMOS camera. (To convert 240V to 12 V.) The guy building the unit asked just how "clean" does the 12 V need to be. If I say "the cleanest possible" it is going to cost me big time.
So I ask what is a sensible value I can stipulate that will not cause issues for the camera?
(PS. I want to move from using my existing battery bank as it is inconvenient and requires monitoring.)
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That's not necessarily an easy question to answer
exactly, but I would have thought a commercially available regulated
linear power supply at your voltage should provide sufficiently clean DC so as not to cause any issue. Maybe you could use a switch-mode supply, but if you are fussy then you'd need to measure it first to be sure which is the best, BUT that all begs the question of whether you will notice. Certainly if the AC component in the DC is too high you will get all sorts of strange effects, certainly with video (and also in any audio application).
Getting back to the theme of Peter's question (hello Peter): why not use the camera's designated supply from the manufacturer? If you feel this isn't good enough perhaps and that could be improved upon, then that depends upon what your objectives are. Will you be powering ONLY the camera with this supply? Which camera? What are the voltage /current requirements for the camera. Some of this can be gleaned from the power supply provided with or recommended for use with the camera by the manufacturer. Also if you had the power supply it could be measured for the cleanliness of its DC output on an oscilloscope and other gear and then you could go crazy and design (or buy) a better supply, with more capacitance, better regulators, inductors, shielding, etc.......
The real question is will it make a difference? Perhaps you could go some way to answer this by looking for reports of others using your camera and the standard manufacturer's power supply reporting any issues related to cleanliness of the DC supply.
Also note that 12 V is not always what it seems in battery/automotive applications. It might be 12V nominal as in the case of a car battery/electronics which is typically 13.5-14V DC. Point of the story is to know what your device is and what it needs to feed it.
Best
JA