Evaluation Engineering - 9

or form-fit-function redesign. Customers
should therefore be careful to select
manufacturers with a proven long-term
support record to ensure the longevity of
their test systems."
Ache, Rohde & Schwarz: "As the lower
part of the RF spectrum is getting more
congested, also traditional applications
move to higher frequency bands. 5G FR2
applications currently aim for frequencies
up to 44 GHz, and 6G will presumably
use even higher frequencies. Automotive
radar jumped from 24 GHz to the 79 GHz
band and satellite applications tend to
move into the Q/V bands. This has a
couple of consequences. Signal purity is
getting more important since effects like
SSB phase noise that are small at frequencies below 6 GHz can become dominant at
mmWave. The flatness of modulated wideband signals is getting important, too."
Keysight: "First, wider bandwidths and
new frequency bands. Cellular communications are moving from 4G toward 5G
to achieve extreme data throughputs;
satellite communications are building
huge networks in space allowing highspeed communications from anywhere.
Second, complex modulation schemes.
In modern wireless communications,
modulation schemes are becoming
more complicated in order to improve
spectral efficiency. Complex modulated
signals result in a higher peak-to-average
power ratio, which lead to more nonlinear
distortions for signal generation. Third,
complex multi-antenna configurations.
Most of the new wireless technologies are
adopting multi-antenna techniques such
as multi-input multi-output and beamforming to improve spectral efficiency
and radio coverage."
McGregor, Newark: "The ability to meet
the needs for 5G testing is the main
challenge for high-performance equipment-as equipment investments made
by customers now will need to support
the testing of products that have not yet
even made it to the drawing board. At
the lower performance end of the market
manufacturers continue to squeeze more
and more functions and features into a

single piece of equipment meeting the
challenge of smaller, lighter, and more
and more portable equipment, yet with
large touch screens for ease of use."
Armstrong, RIGOL Technologies: "More
RF designs are being taken to market
by startups and small engineering firms
without access to all the RF test equipment they used to have just down the
hall. These engineers are testing modern
RF designs that require more complex
signal types as well as higher power signals for many of their new test applications. The integration and development
of these capabilities in solutions that are
still affordable make it easier for engineers to bring their ideas to market on
time and in budget."
Elo, Tabor Electronics: "New commercially available chips are allowing for smaller
form-factor, lower cost signal-generation
technology. Less than five years ago, for
example, a mid-performance signal generator would be a single-channel, 3U rack
model; however, today, in the same rack
space you can fit up to four signal generators, and with portable generators, 16 or
more can fit in a 3U rack configuration."

What are customers asking for?
What key features or attributes are customers asking for in signal generators?
Malatest, Per Vices: "Customers evaluating different signal generators are looking
for more than just the traditional features
(frequency stability, sweep speeds, etc.)
offered by legacy equipment. More and
more are looking for added flexibility
through the inclusion of FPGAs, a greater number of channels, wide operating
frequency, and high bandwidth. These
features become increasingly important
as applications become more advanced.
There is also an increasing need for low
phase noise and aggressive channel masking requirements to be met. Although
this feature is not always required, it is
becoming increasingly popular for high
performance applications."
Sandler, Picotest: "I can only speak to
what our customers are asking for-they

want easy-to-use tools that allow them
to solve problems, and as inexpensively
as possible. Maybe it is our niche, but we
have a lot of customers asking for signal
generators for TDR and harmonic comb
applications that work with their oscilloscope. We now offer such a tool in a USB
stick configuration, but the oscilloscope
manufacturers need to include GUI support and calibration within the scope to
make the best use of our tools."
Rovini, Spectrum Instrumentation: "As
setups are getting more complex, there's
a large demand for mixed-mode applications, having a signal generator with a
number of freely programmable marker
outputs. While classic benchtop devices
normally only have a single trigger/sync
output, Spectrum products offer up to
20 additional digital marker outputs
with the AWG instruments to control
a large number of external devices. A
second demand is for high output levels
in conjunction with high bandwidths.
Spectrum AWGs of the M2p.65xx Series
allow an output level of ±6 V for each
channel on a single PCIe card with eight
AWG channels."
Ache, Rohde & Schwarz: "To enable our
customers to not only pursue, but to push
the technological barriers of their products, we have to offer modern signal generators that cover mmWave frequencies of
up to 70 GHz, offering excellent signal purity and high output power. Vector signal
generators additionally need to support
bandwidths of typically up to 2 GHz while
meeting the requirements for spectral
purity, flatness, and modulation quality. Since applications are diverse, T&M
instruments need to offer the flexibility
and scalability that allows tailoring to the
specific test need. Furthermore, we see an
increasing demand for propagation channel simulation at mmWave frequencies."
Semancik, Marvin Test Solutions: "In
many ways, the basic requirements
have not changed much over the year.
Customers expect ease-of-use, output
stability and accuracy, as well as comprehensive user interfaces. That being said,
customers tend to look for the broadest
NOVEMBER 2019 EVALUATIONENGINEERING.COM

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Evaluation Engineering

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