Microwave Journal
www.microwavejournal.com/articles/12677-aeroflex-adds-three-wireless-measurement-suites-including-wimax-to-pxi-platform-to-speed-production-of-mobile-devices

Aeroflex Adds Three Wireless Measurement Suites including WiMAX to PXI Platform to Speed Production of Mobile Devices

November 15, 2006
Electronica 2006-MUNICH-Stand #A5-117-November 14, 2006-Aeroflex today announced it has added significant new wireless test capabilities to aid the rapid production testing of the most popular consumer mobile devices. Within a single software-definable PXI modular platform, the Aeroflex PXI 3000 series now adds support for WiMAX OFDMA, 1xEVDO and HSUPA. Aeroflex modular RF test systems allow testing of cellular, WLAN and WiMAX in one product, whereas competitive test systems must be configured from numerous instruments making them more costly, bulky, slower and harder to integrate. "Manufacturers are continuously demanding increased test coverage as they strive to maintain their test systems up-to-date with the latest wireless standards. Aeroflex is unique because our modular platform is hardware re-configurable to support different frequency ranges and analysis bandwidths. Our PXI 3000 series now supports any combination of GSM/EDGE, W-CDMA, cdma2000, 1xEVDO, WLAN 802.11a,b, g and WiMAX 802.16e standards within the same platform. No other single product can offer such flexibility," said Tim Carey, product manager, PXI Systems, Aeroflex Stevenage. New PXI Test Suites for WiMAX OFMDA, 1xEVDO and HSUPA Aeroflex provides signal generation and analysis in a single, configurable platform for testing RF components and wireless devices. With Aeroflex's modular PXI-based manufacturing test systems, customers protect their investment by rapidly upgrading their test system via software updates or plug-and-play hardware. Customers can easily add test capability with minimal effort and investment in new equipment and software. WiMAX Measurement Suite The WiMAX measurement suite expands upon the capability of the Aeroflex 3030 series PXI RF digitizer family to perform WiMAX PHY (physical layer) OFDMA (orthogonal frequency domain multiple access) device testing of power, spectrum and modulation measurements in accordance with IEEE 802.16e. Designed for PXI-based RF test systems used in development and manufacturing of PC plug-in cards, handheld terminal devices and modules for integration in other equipment, the WIMAX software library provides analysis of OFDMA RF transmit signal characteristics for both uplink and downlink. For complete RF characterization, the WiMAX measurement library, combined with Aeroflex's IQCreatorTM waveform creation software offers high-performance, high-speed stimulus and response capability for WiMAX OFDMA. CDMA2000 and 1xEVDO Reverse Link Measurement Suite The CDMA2000 measurement suite has been upgraded to include support of 1xEVDO reverse link measurements. Together with an Aeroflex 3030 series PXI RF digitizer, they enable the precision characterization of both CDMA2000 rev C and 1xEVDO rev 0 reverse link transmissions. The CMDA2000 and 1xEVDO measurement suite provides analysis of all major signal characteristics in accordance with the requirements of 3GPP2 C.S0011-A rel C and C.S0024 ver 4 for CDMA2000 and 1xEVDO rev 0 reverse link transmissions. The measurement suite is designed for PXI-based RF test systems used in the development and manufacturing of mobile radio transmitters, sub-modules and RFICs. UMTS Uplink Measurement Suite The UMTS UL (Uplink) measurement suite adds the capability to perform analysis of power, spectrum and modulation for 3GPP rel 6 HSUPA uplink signals. This further enhances the capabilities of the Aeroflex 3030 series RF digitizers. The measurement suite is designed for PXI-based RF test systems used in the development and manufacturing of consumer mobile device radio transmitters and sub-modules. The UMTS UL measurement library provides analysis of all major 3G W-CDMA signal characteristics. Common Features All three new PXI measurement suites are libraries of special functions with both .dll and Visual Basic APIs (application programming interfaces) for use in a broad range of ADEs (application development environments) such as LabVIEW, LabWindows/CVI, Visual Basic and Visual C/C++. Each measurement suite is supplied with Help, including source code examples to aid the user in the development of measurement applications. Examples are provided for a variety of ADEs including Visual Basic 6, LabWindows CVI and Visual Basic C/C++. Price and availability The pricing is unchanged for CDMA2000 with 1xEVDO (3030 option 102) and UMTS UL with HSUPA (3030 option 101) at U.S. $ 4,062. Both updates are available for delivery in 4 weeks upon receipt of order. The new WiMAX measurement suite is introduced as 3030 option 104 and is priced at U.S. $ 4,765. Delivery is 8 weeks upon receipt of order.