Is there a way to measure the noise by using a PNA-X for a fully differential amplifier IC?
Thanks in advance
Mantas
Is there a way to measure the noise by using a PNA-X for a fully differential amplifier IC?
Thanks in advance
Mantas
Hi Mantas,
You are able to make Noise Figure measurements for differential amplifiers using the PNA-X. This application note explains Noise Figure measurements using the PNA-X:
http://literature.cdn.keysight.com/litweb/pdf/5990-5800EN.pdf?id=1961132
Page 40 goes into detail on measuring differential devices.
Best regards,
David
Thanks in deed. Is there also an application note on how to measure the compression point P1dB for a differential amp?
Best regards
Mantas
Hi Mantas,
Here is a white paper on Advanced Measurements and Modeling of Differential Devices:
http://literature.cdn.keysight.com/litweb/pdf/5989-4518EN.pdf?id=777966
See if this is helpful.
Best regards,
David
That papers quite a bit older than the modern techniques.
For PNA-X you can use option 460 (True-mode stimulus) in a power sweep mode to get single-frequency compression curves. But note that the output power is not easy to obtain in this mode.
Option 089 (Differential and IQ) allows you to create a similar sweep and to get differential power (input and output) directly. It is what I would recommend.
The only straight forward way is to add baluns to the differential ports and then de-embed the baluns from the standard noise figure measurement. But on-wafer this is more complicated because you have to de-embed the combination of the balun and the differential probe from each differential port.
My colleague, Dr_Joel, wrote a paper on differential noise figure measurements that you can reference here:
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/5296507/?arnumber=5296507&tag=1