Patent ID: 7795915

Claim:
Power conversion apparatus comprising: a controller comprising at least one driver; at least one switching power converter phase, the switching power converter phase comprising a receiver; a channel for carrying a channel signal between the driver and the receiver, a range of variation of the channel signal comprising: a first region occupying a first continuous range of channel signal amplitudes, the first region defining an enabled state of an enable/disable signal, the first region further comprising a third region and a fourth region, the third and fourth regions being non-overlapping, and a second region, distinct from and not overlapping with the first region, that defines a disabled state of the enable/disable signal, the controller, the driver, the receiver and the channel signal configured so that: the controller delivers an enable/disable control signal to the driver, the controller delivers a switch control signal to the driver, whenever the enable/disable control signal indicates that the power conversion phase is to be disabled, the driver sets the amplitude of the channel signal to be within the second region, whenever the enable/disable control signal indicates that the power conversion phase is to be enabled, the driver sets the amplitude of the channel signal to be within the first region and: (a) causes the channel signal to be in the third region whenever the switch control signal is in a pre-determined one of its two binary states, or (b) causes the channel signal to be in the fourth region whenever the switch control signal is within the other of its two binary states, whenever the channel signal is in the second region, the receiver sets a first binary output signal to a pre-determined one of its two states to indicate that the power conversion phase is to be disabled, and whenever the channel signal is in the first region, the receiver sets the first binary output signal to the other of its two states to indicate that the power conversion phase is to be enabled and: (a) sets a switch control output signal to a pre-determined one of its two binary states whenever the channel signal is in the third region, or (b) sets the switch control output signal to the other of its two binary states whenever the channel signal is in the fourth region.