Analog & Digital Electronics

Course No: PH-218

Lec-13: Multistage Amplifiers

Course Instructors:

Dr. A. P. VAJPEYI

Department of Physics,
Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati, India 1
Multistage Amplifier:
Characteristic Common Common Common
Base Emitter Collector
Input impedance Low Medium High

Output impedance Very High High Low

Phase Angle 0o 180o 0o

Voltage Gain High Medium Low

Current Gain Low Medium High

Power Gain Low Very High Medium

 Common emitter amplifier is most popular BJT amplifier due to high

power gain.

 Ideal amplifier should have high input impedance, low output impedance,
high voltage and current gain.

 Single Stage amplifier is not able to provide enough gain, power and full-
fill all the requirement of an ideal amplifier --------- Need Multistage
amplifier
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Multistage Amplifier: Characteristics

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 Multistage Amplifiers
Practical amplifiers usually consist of a number of stages connected
in cascade.

 The first (input) stage is usually required to provide

a high input resistance

a high common-mode rejection for a differential amplifier

 Middle stages are to provide

majority of voltage gain

conversion of the signal from differential mode to single-end mode

shifting of the dc level of the signal

 The last (output) stage is to provide

a low output resistance in order to

avoid loss of gain and

provide the current required by the load (power amplifiers)

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Multistage Amplifier: Gain Calculation

Procedure:
AvT = Av1 Av 2 Av 3 K
1. Do dc analysis
AiT = Ai1 Ai 2 Ai 3 K 2. Find r’e for each stage
ApT = AvT AiT 3. Find rC for each stage
4. Using r’e and rC to find Av for
each stage

Input impedance of next stage is the load of current stage.

(Zin of next stage is RL of current stage)

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Multistage Amplifiers: Frequency Response
R
Vo = ( )Vin
R − jX c
Vout R
Av = =
Vin R − j (1 / ωC )

1
Av =
1 − j (1 / 2πfCR )

1 1
Av = Av = ∠ tan −1 ( f1 / f )
1 − j ( f1 / f ) 1 + ( f1 / f ) 2
f1 = 1 / 2πRC

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 Multistage Amplifiers: Low cut off Frequency
If n identical stages are connected together then overall voltage gain
at lower frequency is given by:

Av-low = Av1-low × Av2-low × Av3-low ………. ×Avn-low = (Av-low)n

where n is the number of cascaded stages. Since
Av1-low = Av2-low …..= Avn-low

n
 Av−low   Av−low  1
  =   =
 (1 − j ( f1 / f )
n
 Av−mid overall  Av−mid
For lower cutoff frequency : Av-low / Av-mid)overall = 1/√2

1 1 f1
= f c−low =
2 n 1
[1 + ( f1 / f c−low ) ] 2
2 −1
n
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Multistage Amplifiers: High Cutoff Frequency
− jX c Vout 1
Vo = ( )Vin Av = =
R − jX c Vin 1 + j ( RωC )

1 1 1 −1
Av = = Av = ∠ tan ( f / f2 )
2
1 + j (2πfCR ) 1 + j ( f / f 2 ) 1+ ( f / f2 )
where f 2 = 1 / 2πRC
n
 Av − high   Av − high  1
  
= 
 =
A A
 v − mid  overall  v − mid  (1 + j ( f / f 2 )n

For cutoff frequency : Av-high / Av-mid)overall = 1/√2

1 1
= 1
2 n
[1 + ( f c − high / f 2 ) ] 2 f c − high = f 2 2 − 1
n
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Multistage Amplifiers: Frequency Response
The cutoff frequencies for cascaded amplifiers with identical values
of fc1 and fc2 are found using
f c1 1
f c−low = BWoverall = f c−high − f c−low
1 f c−high = f c 2 2 − 1
n

2 −1
n

where n is the number of cascaded stages.

When Each stage has a different lower & upper critical frequency

 When the lower critical frequency, fcL , of each amplifier stage is

different, the dominant lower critical frequency, f'cL equals the
critical frequency of the stage with the highest fcL.

 When the upper critical frequency fcu, of each amplifier stage is

different, the dominant upper critical frequency f'cu, equals the
critical frequency of the stage with the lowest fcu

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Types of Coupling:
In a multistage amplifier the output of one stage makes the input of the
next stage. Normally a network is used between two stages so that a
minimum loss of voltage occurs when the signal passes through this
network to the next stage. Also the dc voltage at the output of one stage
should not be permitted to go to the input of the next. Otherwise, the
biasing of the next stage are disturbed.

The three couplings generally used are.

1.RC coupling
2. Transformer coupling
3. direct coupling
Problem: A transformer coupling is used in the final stage of a multistage amplifier. If the output impedance of
transistor is 1kohm and the speaker has a resistance of 10ohm. Find the turn ratio of the transformer in order to
transfer maximum power to the load (speaker).

Solution: For maximum power transfer, the impedance of the primary should be equal to the output impedance of
the transistor and impedance of secondary should be equal to the load impedance. i.e.
Primary impedance = output impedance of transistor = 1kohm; Secondary impedance = impedance of load = 10ohm
2
RS  N S 
= Ns / Np =1:10
R p  N p 
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RC coupling

It has excellent frequency response in a audio frequency range and

cheaper in cost.

The drawback of this approach is the lower frequency limit imposed by

the coupling capacitor and poor impedance matching.

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Transformer coupling 2
RS  N S 
Transformer coupling is mainly used in =
power amplifiers. R p  N p 
CS capacitor is used to make other
point of transformer grounded, so that
ac signal is applied between base and
ground.
The drawback of this approach is the
poor frequency response.

Direct coupling
Direct coupling is the coupling
method in which the output of one
stage is directly connected to the
input of the next stage.
Direct coupling is used in
differential and operational
amplifiers.
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How the frequency response curve look like for direct coupling?
Comparison of different type of coupling

Characteristic R-C coupling Transformer Direct Coupling

coupling
Frequency Excellent in audio Poor Best
Response frequency range

Cost Less More Least

Space & Less More Least

Weight

Impedance Not good Excellent Good

Matching

Use Voltage Power amplification amplifying extremely

amplification low frequency

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Cascode amplifier
The cascode amplifier is combination of common-emitter and
common-base amplifier.

While the C-B amplifier is known for wider bandwidth than the C-E configuration,
the low input impedance (10s of Ω) of C-B is a limitation for many applications.
The solution is to precede the C-B stage by a low gain C-E stage which has
moderately high input impedance (kΩs).

The key to understanding the wide bandwidth of the cascode configuration is

the Miller effect. 14
Cascode amplifier
A common-base configuration is not subject to the Miller effect because the
grounded base shields the collector signal from being fed back to the emitter input.
Thus, a C-B amplifier has better high frequency response.

The way to reduce the common-emitter gain is to reduce the load resistance. The
gain of a C-E amplifier is approximately RC/re. The collector load RC is the
resistance of the emitter of the C-B stage loading the C-E stage. CE gain amplifier
gain is approximately Av = RC/re=1. This Miller capacitance is Cmiller = Ccbo(1-Av) =
Ccbo (1-(-1)=2Ccbo.

We now have a moderately high input impedance C-E stage without suffering the
Miller effect, but no C-E stage voltage gain. The C-B stage provides a high voltage
gain. The total current gain of cascode is β as current gain of the C-E stage is 1 for
the C-B is β.

A cascode amplifier has a high gain, moderately high

input impedance, a high output impedance, and a high
bandwidth.
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 Darlington Amplifier
It consists of two emitter followers in cascaded mode. The overall gain is
close to unity. The main advantage of Darlington amplifier is very large
increase in input impedence and an equal decrease in output impedance .

Input impedance:
The first transistor has one VBE drop and
second transistor has second VBE drop.
The voltage divider produces VTH to the
input base.

DC emitter current of the 2nd stage

IE2 = (VTH – 2 vBE ) / (RE )

The dc emitter current of the first stage that is the base current of second stage:
IE1 = IE2 / β2

If r'e(2) is neglected then input impedance of second stage is Zin (2) = β2 RE

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Input impedance:
This is the impedance seen by the first transistor. If r'e(1) is also neglected then the
input impedance of 1 becomes. Zin (1) = β1 β2 RE : which is extremely high because
of the products of two betas, so the approximate input impedance of Darlington
amplifier is Zin = R1 || R2

Output impedance:
The Thevenin impedance at the input is given by: RTH = RS || R1 || R2

Similar to single stage common collector amplifier, the output impedance of the
two stages zout(1) and zout(2) are given by.

Therefore, the output impedance

of the amplifier is very small.

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