THS3201 ceramic decoupling caps

Fern Yoon

Other Parts Discussed in Thread: THS3201

Hi team,

When using the THS3201 in wideband, non-inverting configuration, is there any issue with using ceramic decoupling caps instead of tantalum? The example schematic in the datasheet shows tantalum caps and I want to verify that we won't run into issues if ceramic caps were used instead.

Thanks,

Fern

over 12 years ago

0 Luke LaPointe over 12 years ago

TI__Genius 13335 points

Hi Fern,

This should be ok. In the past Tantalum capacitors were chosen because they are cheap and they are rated for higher voltage and capacitance values. But capacitor technology has come a long way. As a general rule of thumb it's better to use ceramics vs tantalum if possible. The main reason being that ceramic capacitors typically have lower ESR.

UltraCAD wrote a good article diving into power supply decoupling and why ESR is important: http://www.ultracad.com/articles/esrbcap.pdf

Another reason is that ceramics can be soldered at higher temperature. The plastic casing of tantalums limits the max available temp and with a push towards lead free solder, this could be a concern. There are also inherent differences in the way both capacitors are constructed which favor the ceramic architechure.

There is a lot of material on the web that discusses the differences. Kemet wrote a good article (slightly skewed towards tantalum) highlighting the advantages and disadvantages: http://www.kemet.com/kemet/web/homepage/kfbk3.nsf/vaFeedbackFAQ/0F05C4C1F74A2D2485256F170052CD15/$file/2008-11%20Update%20-%20Ceramic%20versus%20Tantalum.pdf

Hope this helps!

Let us know if you have any other questions.

Regards,
Luke Lapointe
High Speed Amplifiers

0 Fern Yoon over 12 years ago in reply to Luke LaPointe

TI__Expert 3625 points

Thanks Luke!

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THS3201 ceramic decoupling caps