Welcome back, guys!

We are excited to present to you our version of this highly efficient step-down voltage converter: our Enhanced Mini-360.

After a very long time designing, testing, re-designing, and performing a series of evaluations, we are finally launching this compact regulator based on the MP2307 from Monolithic Power Systems.

The MP2307 has become one of the most popular switched-mode regulators of the past years. Perhaps you have never heard of it by that name, but trust us when we say that you have (hopefully). Does the "Mini-360" ring a bell to you? Just in case you have been living under a rock, please do a quick search on your favorite eBayer or Alibuyer site (wink, wink) and you will know what we are talking about.

Yes, this teeny tiny regulator board has flooded the market due to its extremely small footprint and high-current delivery with high efficiency (when properly designed it can reach up to 95%, according to the manufacturer). Moreover, its ridiculously low price has made it a no-brainer for makers, engineers, and creators.

"What?! 5 boards for 2 USD!! Give me 20 and keep the change!"

However, little is known that the design being sold *everywhere * is highly flawed and the components used are of extremely low quality; therefore it performs really poorly...

...but worry not, we made it much better!

As you might imagine, such a low footprint and cheap design cannot efficiently deliver up to 3 Amps, as promised, right? It's just too good to be true.

Thankfully, some nice chaps have already thoroughly tested and addressed the issues with these Mini-360 boards and therefore we don't have to bore you with a convoluted explanation about why you should NOT buy them and rely on the promised features of these poor little boards. Please refer to the following links to understand with enough detail what are the most relevant problems and design flaws from these Mini-360 boards: 1, 2, 3.

Therefore, we gathered the improvements that our fellow makers have pointed out and proposed our own design and bill of materials to obtain a much better performance... and here it is. Ready for you.

The main features from our Enhanced Mini-360 are:

a. Only original and high-quality components from reputable suppliers were used (Digikey, Mouser, Farnell). b. Our design complies with the manufacturer's recommendations, as per the datasheet: we have included an output Schottky Diode (missing on the original tiny board), input and output capacitors were included according to specs (10 uF X7R), high-current inductor from EPCOS (B82477D4103M000, rated at 3.75A), low-ESR input and output tantalum caps we added, and finally, we included the recommended compensation RC network. c. The switcher IC and peripheral components were laid out with much better distribution. Plenty of stitching and wide ground planes were added for improved thermal performance and power delivery.

Thanks to our careful design, the performance was substantially improved, as can be seen in the attached images. The first image shows the switching waveforms at the coil from our enhanced version while the second one presents the signal from the commercial Mini-360 module. The difference is shocking! Voltage stability is outstanding and thermals are great. As shown in the images, we measured a temperature of approx 51 Celsius (~124 F) at the hottest point (the coil area).

We would like to point out that we are aware that the MP2307 is now being labeled as not recommended for new designs (NRFND), as stated by the manufacturer, which is now recommending the MP2393 however, there is still plenty of supply of these ICs in the market so, we would like to exhaust the stock available out there! Nevertheless, worry not, at some point in the near future we will upgrade our design with the new version so, stay tuned!

Finally and more importantly, we can clearly not offer our version at the ridiculous prices one can get the original Mini-360 for, and thus, we had to come up with a much more ridiculous price :smiley:

In all seriousness, you will be buying the best version available on the market to date of the MP2307 regulator!

It is suitable for powering your power-hungry projects with the confidence that a clean and stable voltage will be feeding them.

Some general notes:

1. Please connect no more than 23V at the input.
2. Limit the current delivery at 3A maximum.
3. Our boards are breadboard friendly. To achieve this the pins were slightly bent inwards to give them a perfect fit. However, it is not recommended to use high currents on a breadboard and care should be taken to avoid melting your prototyping board :wink:

Thanks for shopping

If you have any questions, please get in touch!

Ivory Circuits Team