Current limiting circuit and voltage regulator using the same
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Techniques pertaining to a voltage regulator with a current limiting circuit having low quiescent current are disclosed. According to one aspect of the present invention, a current limiting circuit is provided for limiting a current passing through an output pass circuit of a voltage regulator, the current limiting circuit comprises: a current sampling circuit for sampling the current passing through the output pass circuit to obtain a duplicated current being proportional to the current passing through the output pass circuit; a current mirror circuit for producing a mirror current being proportional to the duplicated current with the duplicated current as a reference current; a current to voltage converter for producing a voltage being proportional to the mirror current; and a voltage comparator for comparing the voltage produced by the current to voltage converter with a threshold voltage and turning off the output pass circuit when the voltage produced by the current to voltage converter is larger than or equal to the threshold voltage.