Archive for Equipment Review

Rohde & Schwarz ZNL 5kHz – 6GHz VNA, SA, Power Meter Combo Review, Teardown & Experiments

January 10, 2021 No comments

In this episode Shahriar takes a detailed look at the Rohde & Schwarz ZNL 5kHz – 6GHz Combo VNA, Spectrum Analyzer & Power Meter instrument.

The instrument offers excellent performance as well as two-port vector network analyzer for bidirectional measurements and Wide dynamic range of 130dB.

This review is organized as follows:

00:00 – Introduction, instrument overview (front/back), basic specifications
05:26 – Teardown, RF analysis, instrument architecture and design 13:58 – Experiments overview, network analyzer functions, calibration, sweep mode, etc.
28:43 – Spectrum analyzer mode, MultiView multi-mode overview, built-in measurements, TOI, etc.
38:08 – Power meter capability, integrated power, TOI versus Pdc, etc.
47:04 – Real-time capabilities, AM/FM demodulation, digital analysis, 3D spectrogram, vector analysis, RF triggering
55:54 – Noise Figure measurement capabilities
58:34 – Concluding remarks

Equipment Review, Experiments, Teardown , , ,

Teardown & Experiments with a Keysight M9505A AXIe Chassis & M8190A Dual 12GS/s 12-bit ARB

November 29, 2020 No comments

In this episode Shahriar repairs a Keysight AXIe Chassis (M9505A) with a broken power button. The power button (with built-in LED) are replaced with a functionality-similar setup. The teardown and architecture of the System Controller and Embedded Controller Module are also presented.

The star of the video is an M8190A Dual-Channel 12GS/s 12-bit (or 8GS/s 14-bit) Arbitrary Waveform Generator module. The instrument provides in excess of 90dBc SFDR, 2G-Samples of memory per-channel, digital up-converter, built-in secondary amplifier path and up to 5GHz of analog output bandwidth. The module is coupled with a Keysight S-Series Oscilloscope for experiments showing multi-tone performance as well as image-rejection and extraordinary EVM performance with modulated signals.

Equipment Repair, Equipment Review, Teardown , , , , ,

Keysight MXR 8-Channel Real-Time Oscilloscope Review, Teardown & Experiments (Part 1)

November 29, 2020 No comments

In this episode Shahriar reviews the long-awaited Keysight MXR-Series 8-Channel 6-GHz 16-GS/s Real-Time Oscilloscope. The Infiniium MXR-Series is the first oscilloscope to offer 6-GHz bandwidth and 16-GSa/s sample rate on every single one of its eight channels. It also offers excellent performance (ENOB up to 9.0, noise as low as 43 µVrms, dedicated ASICs) which exceeds that of the previous S-Series scopes.

This review is organized as follows:

00:00 – Introductions
01:02 – Instrument overview, front-panel and rear interfaces
4:09 – Full acquisition board teardown and analysis including analog front-end
19:29 – First power-on and impressions
20:48 – Comparison and experiments with the Digital Sampling FFT, DDC and RTSA modes
34:04 – Time-base accuracy, frequency counter and DVM experiments
38:30 – Real-Time Eye, Jitter analysis and Equalization capabilities 50:00 – Concluding remarks

Equipment Review, Experiments, Teardown , , , ,

Tektronix 6-Series 4-Channel 25GS/s 8GHz MSO Review, Teardown & Experiments (Part 1)

July 27, 2020 One comment

In this episode Shahriar reviews the top-of-the-line Tektronix 6-Series Oscilloscope. This 4-channel instrument offers 8-GHz of bandwidth at 25GS/s on all channel independently. Tektronix has made great strides in offering low-noise front-end custom ASICs combined with hardware digital down-conversion built into the core of the 6-Series. This enables advanced triggering across in both time and frequency domains as well as multi-domain correlated measurements.
This review is organized as follows:

00:06 – Introductions
01:42 – Instrument design, front and back panels
03:34 – Full acquisition board teardown, analysis and architecture
18:11 – PLL Experiment: Spectrum View, advanced triggering, PLL characterization and debugging
38:33 – Backplane Communication: Jitter analysis, eye diagrams, jitter composition, cross-talk
49:24 – Concluding remarks

Equipment Review, Experiments, Teardown , , , ,

Signal Hound SM200C/B 100kHz – 20GHz Real-Time Spectrum Analyzer Review, Teardown & Experiments

June 15, 2020 3 comments

In this episode Shahriar reviews the long awaited Signal Hound SM200C/B Real-Time 100kHz – 20GHz Real-Time Spectrum Analyzer:

The SM200C is a high-performance spectrum analyzer and monitoring receiver with a 10 Gigabit Ethernet SFP+ port, enabling the SM200C to communicate with a PC over long distances using a fiber optic cable. Designed for remotely-located accurate RF data analysis at the lowest cost possible, the SM200C features:

  • 160 MHz instantaneous bandwidth I/Q streaming over 10GbE
  • SFP+ port for fast, long-distance communication with a PC using an optic cable
  • Device control and data transfer occurs via SFP+ connection, not USB
  • Tunes from 100 kHz to 20 GHz
  • Sweeps at 1 THz/sec at 30 kHz RBW
  • 110 dB of dynamic range
  • Ultra-low phase noise
  • GPIO port antenna switching

The SM200B offers a USB 3.0 PC interface with 40MHz of instantaneous I/Q streaming. Furthermore, the SM200B includes a full 2-second of internal memory at 160MHz of capture bandwidth which an be accessed through the API.

The review is organized as follows:

00:00 – Introduction
00:49 – Overview, build quality and detailed specifications
05:51 – Full teardown, analysis and system architecture
18:00 – 10GbE PC interface using M.2 Key to PCIe converter
19:22 – Experiment #1: FMCW signal analysis, GUI overview & 160MHz capture capabilities
31:33 – Experiment #2: Interfering hunting, FM-versus-time, frequency hopping & advanced triggering
41:32 – Experiment #3: Digital demodulation, phase-noise & equalization
46:02 – Other GUI capabilities, mask & EM compliance, API
47:20 – Concluding remarks

Equipment Review, Experiments, Teardown , , ,
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