Rohde and Schwarz AMIQ Modulation Generator Teardown
tomverbeure.github.io
Rohde and Schwarz AMIQ Modulation Generator Teardown
1–10 of 27 posts
Re: Rohde and Schwarz AMIQ Modulation Generator Teardown
#2Great disassembly job. There's yet another branch of the rabbit hole that Tom almost fell down:
... the multiplier is based on a classic form,
having a translinear core, supported by three
(X, Y, and Z) linearized voltage-to-current
converters, and the load driving output amplifier.
I have no clue how the thing works!
Re: Rohde and Schwarz AMIQ Modulation Generator Teardown
#3Some of this obscure test equipment is very interesting and amazingly designed.
There are probably only a few electrical engineers in the entire world that actually use this stuff on a day to day basis.
Re: Rohde and Schwarz AMIQ Modulation Generator Teardown
#4Great disassembly job. There's yet another branch of the rabbit hole that Tom almost fell down: ... the multiplier is based on a classic form, having a translinear core, supported by three (X, Y, and Z) linearized voltage-to-current converters, and the load driving output amplifier. I have no clue how the thing works! The 'translinear' school of design was founded (or at least popularized) by Barrie Gilbert at Analog…
Gilbert was a legend of analog design.
Here's a lecture by him on the translinear principle: https://youtu.be/LQNJVtcFrCc
And here's some history of his work at Tektronix (where he discovered the translinear principle): https://vintagetek.org/barrie-gilbert/
Re: Rohde and Schwarz AMIQ Modulation Generator Teardown
#5Does anyone know what company auctions this stuff? The author doesn't say.
Re: Rohde and Schwarz AMIQ Modulation Generator Teardown
#6Does anyone know what company auctions this stuff? The author doesn't say.
I had the same question. Seems the UC schools use Publicsurplus.com, but last time I looked, I didn't see anything interesting.
Re: Rohde and Schwarz AMIQ Modulation Generator Teardown
#7Some of this obscure test equipment is very interesting and amazingly designed. There are probably only a few electrical engineers in the entire world that actually use this stuff on a day to day basis.
R&S equipment is pretty common in the cellular industry. There is more of it out there than you would think. While this particular signal generator is maybe not the most common piece of equipment you will see lots of R&S spectrum analyzers and the like.
Re: Rohde and Schwarz AMIQ Modulation Generator Teardown
#8ELI5: what is this used for?
Re: Rohde and Schwarz AMIQ Modulation Generator Teardown
#9Some of this obscure test equipment is very interesting and amazingly designed. There are probably only a few electrical engineers in the entire world that actually use this stuff on a day to day basis.
R&S equipment is pretty common in the cellular industry. There is more of it out there than you would think. While this particular signal generator is maybe not the most common piece of equipment you will see lots of R&S spectrum analyzers and the like.
It's technically not a signal generator but an Arbitrary Waveform Generator. It provides a base-band modulated signal to the signal generator which the sig gen upconverts to the RF carrier. If you purchased a Vector Signal Generator this would be built in but you can still buy them stand alone and they are pretty common. NI, R&S, Tek, and Keysight all have product lines of them.
Another way to think about it, this would be comparable to a signal generator in the same way that an oscilloscope is comparable to a spectrum analyzer.
Re: Rohde and Schwarz AMIQ Modulation Generator Teardown
#10ELI5: what is this used for?
It’s used to create communication test signals.
Say you designed a Bluetooth transceiver chip and need to test the performance under stress conditions: noise, sample clock instability etc.
The WinIQSim software simulates such a signal and uploads it to the AMIQ, which is essentially a high quality digital analog converter.
The analog output will go to an RF signal generator and then to your chip under test.