Difference between halfbridge driver ICs and low/high side drivers?

[Arcatarter]

Hi all, I am designing a class D amp using a TL494, and while the typical halfbridge used often in sstcs works fine for testing it obviously has issues, especially at lower freq. I am going to use a split rail supply, but I stumbled upon something that confused me.

I am using a half bridge driver (L6384), but it seems that most other amplifiers with a split rail supply use a low/high side driver (such as IR2110). Is there a specific reason that many schematics use this IR2110 or equiv instead of a typical 8 DIP halfbridge driver? I feel like I am missing something here. The halfbridge driver has far less pins, has built in variable deadtime, and is easier to implement than the IR2110 etc. so I don't quite understand why many people gravitate toward an IR2110 or equiv. despite having looked through the datasheets. I cant see any reason that a halfbridge driver such as the I6384

Thanks for any words of wisdom!

[johnnyzoo]

IR2110 has been available for a long time, maybe that's why it's popular among hobbyists and designers. Just my 2 cents.

Check that the driver chip has the capability (frequency range, gate charge, maximum high-side voltage) to drive the switching transistors you are using, and the features you need (dead time control etc.), and you should be fine.

[Arcatarter]

IR2110 has been available for a long time, maybe that's why it's popular among hobbyists and designers. Just my 2 cents.

Check that the driver chip has the capability (frequency range, gate charge, maximum high-side voltage) to drive the switching transistors you are using, and the features you need (dead time control etc.), and you should be fine.

Hey, thanks for your reply! That actually makes a lot of sense, that the ir2110 is in many circuits because of availability. Ive never even seen the L6384 in a schematic before :p. For whatever reason, I had just convinced myself that I was missing something even though using a halfbridge with a split rail supply does the *exact* same thing as with the capacitors that make up the psuedo split rail supply (no idea if there is a better term for that  ).

Now I just need to figure out why my amp stopped working when i went to a split rail supply, time for more research (and by that I mean adding another halfbridge driver and making an H bridge)