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MODULE -2 Frequency Response of Amplifier
Frequency curve of an RC coupled amplifier:
A practical amplifier circuit is meant to raise the voltage level of the input signal. This signaL
may be obtained from anywhere e.g. radio or TV receiver circuit. Such a signal is not of a single
frequency. But it consists of a band of frequencies, e.g. from 20 Hz to 20 KHz. If the loudspeakers are
to reproduce the sound faithfully, the amplifier used must amplify all the frequency components of
signal by same amount. If it does not do so, the output of the loudspeaker will not be the exact replica
of the original sound. When this happen then it means distortion has been introduced by the
amplifier. Consider an RC coupled amplifier circuit shown in fig. 1.

Fig. 1 Fig. 2
Fig. 2, shows frequency response curve of a RC coupled amplifier. The curve is usually plotted
on a semilog graph paper with frequency range on logarithmic scale so that large frequency
range can be accommodated. The gain is constant for a limited band of frequencies. This
range is called mid-frequency band and gain is called mid band gain. AVM. On both sides of
the mid frequency range, the gain decreases. For very low and very high frequencies the
gain is almost zero.
In mid band frequency range, the coupling capacitors and bypass capacitors are as good as
short circuits. But when the frequency is low. These capacitors can no longer be replaced by
the short circuit approximation.

First consider coupling capacitor. The ac equivalent is shown in fig. 3, assuming capacitors are
offering some impedance. In mid-frequency band, the capacitors are ac shorted so the input
voltage appears directly acrossr'e but at low frequency the XC is significant and some
voltage drops across XC. The input vin at the base decreases. Thus decreasing output voltage.
The lower the frequency the more will be XC and lesser will be the output voltage.
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Fig. 3

Similarly at low frequency, output capacitor reactance also increases. The voltage across RL
also reduces because some voltage drop takes place across XC. Thus output voltage reduces.

The XC reactance not only reduces the gain but also change the phase between input and
output. It would not be exactly 180 o but decided by the reactance. At zero frequency, the
capacitors are open circuited therefore output voltage reduces to zero.

The other component due to which gain decreases at low frequencies is the bypass capacitor.
The function of this capacitor is to bypass ac and blocks dc The impedence of this capacitor
in mid frequency band is very low as compared to RE so it behaves like ac short but as the
frequency decrease the XCE becomes more and no longer behaves like ac short. Now the
emitter is not ac grounded. The ac emitter current i.e. divides into two parts i1 and i2, as
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shown in fig. 4. A current i1 passes through RE and rest of the current passes through C. Due
to ac current i1 in RE, an ac voltage is developed i1 * RE. With the polarity marked at an
instant. Thus the effective VL voltage is given by

Vbe = Vs ? RE.

Thus the effective voltage input is reduced. The output also reduces. The lower the frequency,
the lesser will be the gain. This reduction in gain is due to negative feedback.

As the frequency of the input signal increases, again the gain of the amplifier reduces. Firstly
the  of the transistor decreases at higher frequency. Thus reducing the voltage gain of the
amplifier at higher frequencies as shown in fig. 5.

The other factor responsible for the reduction in gain at higher frequencies is the presence of
various capacitors as shown in fig. 6. They are not physically connected but inherently
present with the device.

Fig. 5

The capacitor Cbc between the base and the collector connects the output with the input.
Because of this, negative feedback takes place in the circuit and the gain decreases. This
feedback effect is more, when Cbc provides a path for higher frequency ac currents

The capacitance Cbe offers a low input impedance at higher frequency thus reduces the
effective input signal and so the gain falls. Similarly, Cce provides a shunting effect at high
frequencies in the output side and reduces gain of the amplifier.

Besides these junction capacitances there are wiring capacitance CW1 and CW2. These reactance
are very small but at high frequencies they become 5 to 20 p.f. For a multistage amplifier,

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the effect of the capacitances Cce,CW1 and CW2 can be represented by single shunt
capacitance.

CS = CW1 + CW2 +Cce.

At higher frequency, the capacitor CS offers low input impedance and thus reduces the output.

Fig. 6

Bandwidth of an amplifier:

The gain is constant over a frequency range. The frequencies at which the gain reduces to
70.7% of the maximum gain are known as cut off frequencies, upper cut off and lower cut
off frequency. fig. 7, shows these two frequences. The difference of these two frequencies is
called Band width (BW) of an amplifier.

BW = f2 ? f1.

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Fig. 7

At f1 and f2, the voltage gain becomes 0.707 Am(1 /  2). The output voltage reduces to 1 / 
2 of maximum output voltage. Since the power is proportional to voltage square, the output
power at these frequencies becomes half of maximum power. The gain on dB scale is given
by

20 log10(V2 / V1) = 10 log 10 (V2 / V1)2 = 3 dB.

20 log10(V2 / V1) = 20 log10(0.707) =10 log10 (1 /  2)2 = 10 log10(1 / 2) = -3 dB.

If the difference in gain is more than 3 dB, then it can be detected by human. If it is less than 3
dB it cannot be detected.

Direct Coupling:

For applications, where the signal frequency is below 10 Hz, coupling and bypass capacitors
cannot be used. At low frequencies, these capacitors can no longer be treated as ac short
circuits, since they offer very high impedance. If these capacitors are used then their values
have to be extremely large e.g. to bypass a 100 ohm emitter resistor at 10 Hz, we need a
capacitor of approximately 1600 F. The lower the frequency the worse the problem
becomes.

To avoid this, direct coupling is used. This means designing the stages without coupling and
bypass capacitors, so that the direct current is coupled as well as alternating current. As a
result, there is no lower frequency limit. The amplifier enlarges the signal no matter have
low frequency including dc or zero frequency.
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One Supply Circuit:

Fig. 8, shows a two stage direct coupled amplifier, no coupling or bypass capacitors are used.
With a quiescent input voltage 1.4 V, emitter voltage = 1.4 - 0.7 = 0.7 V

Fig. 8

The output varies from +6V to +8V.

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The main disadvantage is variation in transistor characteristic with variation in temperature.

This causes IC and VC to change. Because of the direct coupling the voltage changes are
coupled from one stage to next stage, appearing at the final output as an amplified voltage.
The unwanted change is called drift.

Grounded Reference Input

For the above amplifier, we need a quiescent voltage of 1.4V. In most applications, it is
necessary to have grounded reference input one where the quiescent input voltage is 0 V, as
shown in fig. 9.

Fig. 9

The quiescent V CE of the first transistor is only 0.7V and the quiescent of the second transistor
is only 1.4V. Both the transistors are operating in active region because VCE(sat) is only 0.1
volt. The input is only in mV, which means that these transistors continue to operate in the
active region when a small signal is present.

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h-Parameters

Small signal low frequency transistor Models:

All the transistor amplifiers are two port networks having two voltages and two currents. The
positive directions of voltages and currents are shown in fig. 1.

Fig. 1

Out of four quantities two are independent and two are dependent. If the input current i1 and
output voltage v2 are taken independent then other two quantities i2 and v1 can be expressed
in terms of i1 and V2.

The equations can be written as

where h11, h12, h21 and h22 are called h-parameters.

= hi = input impedance with output short circuit to ac.

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=hr = fraction of output voltage at input with input open circuited or reverse voltage gain with
input open circuited to ac (dimensions).

= hf = negative of current gain with output short circuited to ac.

The current entering the load is negative of I 2. This is also known as forward short circuit
current gain.

= ho = output admittance with input open circuited to ac.

If these parameters are specified for a particular configuration, then suffixes e,b or c are also
included, e.g. hfe ,h ib are h parameters of common emitter and common collector amplifiers

Using two equations the generalized model of the amplifier can be drawn as shown in fig. 2.

Fig. 2

The hybrid model for a transistor amplifier can be derived as follow:

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Let us consider CE configuration as show in fig. 3. The variables, iB, iC ,vC, and vB represent
total instantaneous currents and voltages iB and vC can be taken as independent variables and
vB, IC as dependent variables.

Fig. 3

vB = f1 (iB ,vC )

IC = f2 ( iB , vC ).

Using Taylor 's series expression, and neglecting higher order terms we obtain.

The partial derivatives are taken keeping the collector voltage or base current constant. The Δ
vB, Δ vC, Δ iB, Δ iC represent the small signal (incremental) base and collector current and
voltage and can be represented as vb ,ib ,vC ,iC.

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The model for CE configuration is shown in fig. 4.

Fig. 4

Determination of h - parameters:

To determine the four h-parameters of transister amplifier, input and output characteristic are
used. Input characteristic depicts the relationship between input voltage and input current
with output voltage as parameter. The output characteristic depicts the relationship between
output voltage and output current with input current as parameter. Fig. 5, shows the output
characterisitcs of CE amplifier.

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Fig. 5

The current increments are taken around the quiescent point Q which corresponds to iB = IB
and to the collector voltage VCE = VC

The value of hoe at the quiescent operating point is given by the slope of the output
characteristic at the operating point (i.e. slope of tangent AB).

hie is the slope of the appropriate input on fig. 6, at the operating point (slope of tangent EF at
Q).

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Fig. 6

A vertical line on the input characteristic represents constant base current. The parameter hre
can be obtained from the ratio (VB2? V B1 ) and (VC2? V C1 ) for at Q.

Typical CE h-parametersof transistor 2N1573 are given below:

hie = 1000 ohm.

hre = 2.5 * 10 ?4
hfe = 50
hoe = 25 A / V

Analysis of a transistor amplifier using h-parameters:

To form a transistor amplifier it is only necessary to connect an external load and signal source
as indicated in fig. 1 and to bias the transistor properly.

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Consider the two-port network of CE amplifier. RS is the source resistance and ZL is the load
impedence h-parameters are assumed to be constant over the operating range. The ac
equivalent circuit is shown in fig. 2. (Phasor notations are used assuming sinusoidal voltage
input). The quantities of interest are the current gain, input impedence, voltage gain, and
output impedence.

Fig. 2

Current gain:

For the transistor amplifier stage, Ai is defined as the ratio of output to input currents.

Input Impedence:

The impedence looking into the amplifier input terminals ( 1,1' ) is the input impedence Z i

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Voltage gain:

The ratio of output voltage to input voltage gives the gain of the transistors.

Output Admittance:

It is defined as

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Av is the voltage gain for an ideal voltage source (Rv = 0).

Consider input source to be a current source IS in parallel with a resistance R S as shown in fig.
3.

Fig. 3

In this case, overall current gain AIS is defined as

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To analyze multistage amplifier the h-parameters of the transistor used are obtained from
manufacture data sheet. The manufacture data sheet usually provides h-parameter in CE
configuration. These parameters may be converted into CC and CB values. For example fig.
4 hrc in terms of CE parameter can be obtained as follows.

Fig. 4

For CE transistor configuaration

Vbe = hie Ib + hre Vce

Ic = h fe Ib + hoe Vce

The circuit can be redrawn like CC transistor configuration as shown in fig. 5.

Vbc = hie Ib + hrc Vec

Ic = hfe Ib + hoe Vec

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Fig. 5

Example - 1

For the circuits shown in fig. 1. (CE?CC configuration) various h-parameters are given

h ie = 2K, hfe = 50, hre = 6 * 10 -4, h oc= 25  A/ V.

hic = 2K, hfe = -51, hre = 1, hoc = 25  A/ V.

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Fig. 1

The small signal model of the transistor amplifier is shown in fig. 2.

Fig. 2

In the circuit, the collector resistance of first stage is shunted by the input impedence of last
stage. Therefore the analysis is started with last stage. It is convenient; to first compute
current gain, input impedence and voltage gain. Then output impedence is calculated
starting from first stage and moving towards end.

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The effective source resistance R'S2 for the second

stage is R01 || RC1 . Thus RS2 = R'01 = 4.65K

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Overall current gain of the amplifier is Ai and is given by

The equivalent circuit of the amplifier is shown in fig. 3. From the circuit it is clear that the
current ic1 is divided into two parts.

Therefore,

and

Overall voltage gain of the amplifier is given by

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Simplified common emitter hybrid model:

In most practical cases it is appropriate to obtain approximate values of A V , A i etc rather than
calculating exact values. How the circuit can be modified without greatly reducing the
accuracy. Fig. 4 shows the CE amplifier equivalent circuit in terms of h-parameters Since 1
/ hoe in parallel with RL is approximately equal to RL if 1 / hoe >> RL then hoe may be
neglected. Under these conditions.

Ic = hfe IB .

hre vc = hre Ic RL = hre hfe Ib RL .

Fig. 4

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Since h fe.h re  0.01, this voltage may be neglected in comparison with h ic Ib drop across h ie
provided RL is not very large. If load resistance RL is small than hoe and hre can be
neglected.

Output impedence seems to be infinite. When V s = 0, and an external voltage is applied at the
output we fined Ib = 0, I C = 0. True value depends upon RS and lies between 40 K and 80K.

On the same lines, the calculations for CC and CB can be done.

CE amplifier with an emitter resistor:

The voltage gain of a CE stage depends upon hfe. This transistor parameter depends upon
temperature, aging and the operating point. Moreover, hfe may vary widely from device to
device, even for same type of transistor. To stabilize voltage gain A V of each stage, it
should be independent of hfe. A simple and effective way is to connect an emitter resistor R e
as shown in fig. 5. The resistor provides negative feedback and provide stabilization.

Fig. 5

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An approximate analysis of the circuit can be made using the simplified model.

Subject to above approximation A V is completely stable. The output resistance is infinite for
the approximate model.

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