I just acquired an E4406A VSA and an E4431A ESG signal generator, both for a superb price.
I've spent a lot of time learning the ins and outs of these units. I'm not sure how useful the E4406a is really going to be for me as it only has
basic and GSM options loaded into it, and I need digital modulation analysis capacity but not for cell systems, but the generator seems
to be all I'd ever need, or close to it.
But now I want to ask: What's the software basis that these units operate on? It appears that during power-up they're running X Windows,
so it's a unix platform. (Which begs the question, I can hook up a keyboard and mouse, and while a mouse works, a regular PS2 keyboard
did not. Does this require a Sun type keyboard?)
What platform is the application software running on? If I were to decide to make the effort to learn to write my own applications for it,
what would be the software/language required to do so? I tend to doubt that it's Labview, but I can at least understand that whatever the
unit uses, it is roughly akin to Labview, a graphical instrument operating environment. So what is it, exactly?
Now, having gone this far, I want to ask, assuming I have the appropriate keyboard, how would one use it to gain access to the file system or be able to perform maintenance and exploration tasks in the unit's software, and issue specific commands from the keyboard if there was a reason for me to do so and I was competent to do so safely?
I realize these are pretty elementary questions, but when it comes to the software aspects of modern test equipment, I don't have any
experience as of yet, and I want to start getting some.
I've spent a lot of time learning the ins and outs of these units. I'm not sure how useful the E4406a is really going to be for me as it only has
basic and GSM options loaded into it, and I need digital modulation analysis capacity but not for cell systems, but the generator seems
to be all I'd ever need, or close to it.
But now I want to ask: What's the software basis that these units operate on? It appears that during power-up they're running X Windows,
so it's a unix platform. (Which begs the question, I can hook up a keyboard and mouse, and while a mouse works, a regular PS2 keyboard
did not. Does this require a Sun type keyboard?)
What platform is the application software running on? If I were to decide to make the effort to learn to write my own applications for it,
what would be the software/language required to do so? I tend to doubt that it's Labview, but I can at least understand that whatever the
unit uses, it is roughly akin to Labview, a graphical instrument operating environment. So what is it, exactly?
Now, having gone this far, I want to ask, assuming I have the appropriate keyboard, how would one use it to gain access to the file system or be able to perform maintenance and exploration tasks in the unit's software, and issue specific commands from the keyboard if there was a reason for me to do so and I was competent to do so safely?
I realize these are pretty elementary questions, but when it comes to the software aspects of modern test equipment, I don't have any
experience as of yet, and I want to start getting some.
The E4406A was developed as a vector signal analyzer with predefined measurements for various wireless standards. It was also possible to use 89601A VSA software with E4406A to use it as a general purpose digitizer. Support from the 89601A software for the E4406A has since been dropped. Nevertheless, you can still use the E4406A a digitizer. I have listed the SCPI command below for how to use the E4406A to capture I/Q data. You can use a programming environment like MATLAB or Agilent VEE or Visual Studio to use the I/Q data to perform whatever demodulation you would like. The E4406A uses an operating system called HP-RT, which is a flavor of HP-UX. It is a closed operating system.
The methodology to grab the I/Q data is as follows:
:INST:SEL BASIC // Set the analyzer in Basic mode
:FREQ:CENTER xxxMHz // Set center frequency
:FORM REAL,32 // Set the returned data type to REAL, 32
:FORM:BORD SWAP // Set the Byte order to Swap
:INIT:CONT 0 // Set analyzer to single sweep
:WAV:BWID:RES 300kHz // Set RBW
:WAV:BAND:TYPE FLAT // Set filter to Flattop
:CAL:TCOR ON // Turn time corrections on
POW:RF:ATT xx // Set attenuation
:WAV:SWE:TIME xxx // Set sweep time
:WAV:ACQ:PACK xx // Set data packing if necessary (Only needed for
RBWs between 1.2 and 7.5 MHz where you need
more dynamic range, although this may not be
recommended)
:READ:WAV0? // Returns the I/Q data
I hope this helped -
Relevant Products:#E4406A#