This course provides RF engineers, system designers, manufacturing engineers and other professionals with the essential concepts needed to understand effectively RF and wireless products. This program provides a thorough understanding of RF parameters and as they apply to Wireless applications. At the system level, this course combines theory with real-life examples, providing participants with a complete foundation in understanding architectures - the physical layer requirements and RF measurement techniques.
Upon completing the course you will be able to:
Engineers, programmers, chip designers, and engineering managers involved in the design, planning, implementation, or testing of communication systems would benefit from this intermediate-level course. Participants should have a BSEE or equivalient.
Recordings of instructor Rick Fornes recent live web classroom course can now be viewed online at your convenience anywhere you have internet access. Each part is ~ 3 hours.
• Overview of fundamentals • Wave parameters: frequency, amplitude, and phase • Complex impedances and admittances • The basics of propagation • Understanding dB, dBm, and RF power • Characteristic impedances • Power-flow and traveling waves • Reflection coefficient, VSWR, Return Loss • Calculating mismatch losses
• Scattering (S) parameters • Differences between Small Signal and Large Signal S-parameters • Cascading building blocks
Optimizing RF Circuit Performance
• Real and complex terminations • Bandwidth considerations • Component equivalent circuits • Component losses and parasitics • Test fixtures and de-embedding • Power flow in two port networks • Basic design techniques
• Why Digital • Defining Performance Standards: Bit Error Rate (BER) and Block Error rate (BLER) • Data rates, symbol rates, Eb/No and C/N ratios • Trade-offs between Digital Modulation Techniques and RF Performance
• Noise figure (NF) • Sensitivity • Spurious free Dynamic range • Intermodulation distortion (IP3/IP2) • System analysis techniques
• System Architectures and Integration Techniques • Defining System Performance Requirements • Direct Conversion Vs. Up/Down conversion • Architecture Examples
• Wireless standards • RF Test Systems • RF Test methods • Qualification and Regulatory approval • Receiver - Sensitivity - C/I Performance - Blocking Performance - Intermodulation Performance - Pin Max • Transmitter - Output power - Tx output spectrum - Modulation characteristics - Carrier frequency shift - Adjacent Channel Power (ACP) - Out-of-Band spurious emissions