The damage of overvoltage and big arc caused by strongly pulling out the magnetic switch in the traditional process of de-excitation makes the de-excitation problem of the large generator become an important research subject. The technology of power electronics soft-switching provides a new way for the de-excitation of the large generator. In this paper, a de-excitation system and its corresponding control circuit is designed based on the excitation parameters of the Three Gorges Power Plant. And it proposes a new way to build pressure nonlinear resistor in de-excitation, namely "parallel charged, series discharged", which significantly reduces the impact of voltage in de-excitation process, the de-excitation main switch is pulled off when the main circuit current reduces to zero. The theoretical and simulation analysis prove that the time from the start of de-excitation system to the start time of the nonlinear resistor is 0.07s. The de-excitation time is 0.4s, indicating that the de-excitation system is fast, safe and reliable.