For a back-light module with multiple cold cathode fluorescent lamps (CCFLs) in mid-size or large size liquid crystal displays, a balance scheme must be included to have approximately equal currents among the lamps and hence to output equal brightness. In this thesis, a half-bridge inverter is adopted to drive multiple step-up transformers with the same turn ratio, in which the primary windings of the transformers are connected in series whereas the second windings drive CCFLs in parallel. Due to the series connection of the transformer sets, the current going through the primary windings is identical, so that the lamp currents from second windings tend to be equal. A driver circuit with the proposed scheme is designed for 8 U-type cold cathode fluorescent lamps in a 32-inch backlight module. The simulation and experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the balance scheme, even for the lamps operating at low current.

A high-frequency half-bridge series resonant inverter with multiple output transformers is developed for driving multiple cold-cathode fluorescent lamps (CCFLs) with dimming feature. The primary sides of the transformers are connected in series with the resonant inverter to have an identical current, while the secondary sides are loaded by CCFLs with galvanic isolation to each other. To ensure a high circuit efficiency, the active power switches of the inverter are designed to be switched on at zero voltage. The resonant current of the inverter can be regulated by controlling the switching frequency of the inverter, so that all CCFLs can be dimmed simultaneously. On the other hand, the primary sides of the output transformers are associated with parallel switches to dim the CCFLs individually. These dimming switches are operated at a low frequency by integral cycle control with zero current switching (ZCS) to reduce the switching losses. The resonant circuit is tactfully designed to alleviate the variation of the resonant current caused by the switching of dimming switches. A laboratory circuit is built for driving 5 CCFLs. The intended circuit performances are confirmed by test results. The variation of the resonant current is less than 10% when the dimming switches are switching, and the measured efficiency for the circuit is 96.15% under the rated powers.