Digital Vector Signal Analysis Capability Debuts
Rick Nelson, Chief Editor -- Test & Measurement World, 1/18/2006 3:51:00 PM
San Diego, CA. Agilent Technologies chose IEEE MTT Wireless Week 2006, held here this week, to announce the integration of the Agilent's logic analyzers with the company's 89600 Series VSA (vector signal analysis) software. The company describes the resulting combination as a digital vector-signal-analysis system that delivers precise, accurate modulation measurements on the digitized communication signals found in today’s DSP-based radio transceivers used in cell phones, base stations, satellite and military communications systems, and radar applications.
Agilent application specialist Mark Lombardi said the need for such a combination is driven by the fact that access to analog I/Q signals is disappearing as data converters become integrated within RF and IF blocks. With VSA software running on a logic analyzer, he said, digitized transmit and receive signals found on the data buses between base-band and RF blocks can be analyzed in the time, frequency, and modulation domains within a logic analyzer just as if they were in analog form.
Lombardi commented that analog base-band circuitry might be disappearing, but the need to make the measurements that used to be made in analog form is not, therefore mandating a digital approach. He said such digital measurements will become increasingly important with the move to 4G applications and to devices conforming to the DigRF interface standard. He added that it will be beneficial for RF and digital designers to have access to the same software for making their respective antenna and base-band EVM measurements.“Agilent recognizes the increasing complexity facing digital communication design teams and is committed to providing leading-edge analysis tools that address these challenges,” said Siegfried Gross, VP and GM of Agilent’s Digital Verification Solutions Division, in a prepared statement. “Our industry-first Digital VSA solutions provide a unique, comprehensive toolset for the communications industry, allowing both RF and digital base-band teams to share the same tools and measurements. This results in an unprecedented level of confidence and time savings, thus reducing time to market.”
Running on Agilent 1680, 1690, and 16900 Series logic analyzers, the Digital VSA software provides analysis of digital base-band or digital IF signals in a variety of formats, including scalar base band, scalar IF, complex I/Q, magnitude and phase, and phase only. It also permits flexible demodulation that measures carrier offset, error vector magnitude, and frequency error for QPSK, QAM, GSM, EDGE, WiMAX, W-CDMA and others. Finally, it supports multiple display formats, including phase vs. time, frequency vs. time, and spectrogram. Prices for the addition of the Digital VSA software to a logic analyzer start at $10,000.
