Introduction to Radio Frequency (RF)

Measurements for Wireless

Communication Systems

RamaKrishna “RK” Yellapantula

LitePoint Corporation
www.dsponlineconference.com
Arlington Heights, IL, ISA
 AGENDA

Baseband and Radio RF Measurements

1 Frequency (RF) Communication 4

RF Modulation Techniques Examples

2 5

RF Impairments Summary
3 6

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 2 DSPOnlineConference.com

 THE SPEAKER
Senior Member of Technical Staff
RamaKrishna “RK” Yellapantula
LitePoint Corporation, USA

Wireless Knowledge:
2G, 3G, 4G, 5GNR
Work Experience:
2010 – Present: LitePoint Corporation
1998 – 2010: Motorola Inc.,
1996 – 1998: USRobotics/3Com
Education:
PhD: University of Illinois – Chicago
MBA: University of Chicago
7 Issued Patents and many publications

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 3 DSPOnlineConference.com

 Baseband Communication System

• Transmit the baseband signal over a lowpass channel

• Examples:
• ADSL, Cable Modem etc.,
• Source of Typical Errors:
• Channel, Noise, ADC/DAC clock drift
• Pros:
• Simple to implement
• Reliable communication even at low SNRs
• Cons:
• Bandwidth limited
• Wireline
• Not easy to scale/deploy
© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 4 DSPOnlineConference.com
 Baseband Communication System

Transmitter

DATA TX
In Coding Mod DAC
Filter

Source of
Controllable
Channel
Errors

DATA Channel/Timing RX
Out Decode DeMod
Correction
ADC
Filter ∑
Source of
AWGN Uncontrollable
Errors
Receiver

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 5 DSPOnlineConference.com

 RF Communication System
• Modulate the baseband signal with a high frequency carrier
• Examples:
• Cellular, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth etc.,
• Source of Errors:
• Propagation Conditions, Noise, TX/RX impairments
• Pros:
• Wireless
• NOT bandwidth limited (within limits)
• easy to scale/deploy
• Cons:
• Power Limited
• TX/RX should be very precisely synchronized
© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 6 DSPOnlineConference.com
 RF Communication System

Transmitter

DATA TX
In Coding Mod DAC Mixer PA
Filter
Channel

~ Source of
Controllable
Errors

DATA Channel/Timing RX
Decode DeMod ADC Mixer LNA
Out Correction Filter

~ Source of
Uncontrollable
Errors
Receiver

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 7 DSPOnlineConference.com

 RF building blocks
• Mixer
• Converts a baseband signal into an RF bandpass signal (Up Conversion)
• Converts a RF bandpass signal into a baseband signal (Down Conversion)
• Impairments
• Frequency error
• Phase noise
• IQ gain imbalance
• IQ phase imbalance
• Carrier leakage
• Digital To Analog Converter (DAC)
• Converts the digital samples into an analog waveform
• Impairments: Sampling clock jitter, Sampling rate shift etc.,
• Analog To Digital Converter (ADC)
• Converts the analog waveform into digital samples
• Impairments: Sampling clock jitter, Sampling rate shift etc.,
• Power Amplifier (PA)
• Amplifies the RF signal for long distance transmission
• Impairments: Intermodulation products due to limited dynamic range
• Low Noise Amplifier (LNA)
• Amplifies the received RF signal
• Impairments: Intermodulation products due to limited dynamic range
© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 8 DSPOnlineConference.com
 DSB-SC Modulation
• Double Sideband Suppressed Carrier (DSB-SC) Modulation
• Pros: Very simple to implement, Low cost equipment
• Cons: Poor usage of spectrum and power

1
𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋𝑓𝑚 𝑡 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋𝑓𝑐 𝑡 = 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋 𝑓𝑐 − 𝑓𝑚 𝑡 + 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋 𝑓𝑐 + 𝑓𝑚 𝑡
2

Mixer
USB LSB LSB USB
-fm 0 fm -fc-fm -fc -fc+fm 0 fc-fm fc fc+fm
Baseband ~ Bandpass

-fc 0 fc
Carrier

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 9 DSPOnlineConference.com

 Single Sideband (SSB) Modulation
• Pros: Efficient use of the spectrum and power
• Cons: High cost equipment, sophisticated signal processing, TX/RX
synchronization, prone to TX/RX impairments
• Can be implemented using Direct Up Conversion (DUC) Transmitter
• Lower Sideband (LSB): 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋𝑓𝑚 𝑡 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋𝑓𝑐 𝑡 + 𝑠𝑖𝑛 2𝜋𝑓𝑚 𝑡 𝑠𝑖𝑛 2𝜋𝑓𝑐 𝑡 = 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋 𝑓𝑐 − 𝑓𝑚 𝑡

• Upper Sideband (USB): 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋𝑓𝑚 𝑡 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋𝑓𝑐 𝑡 − 𝑠𝑖𝑛 2𝜋𝑓𝑚 𝑡 𝑠𝑖𝑛 2𝜋𝑓𝑐 𝑡 = 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋 𝑓𝑐 + 𝑓𝑚 𝑡

LSB LSB
Mixer
-fc -fc+fm 0 fc-fm fc

-fm 0 fm
Baseband ~ USB USB
-fc-fm -fc 0 fc fc+fm
-fc 0 fc
Bandpass
Carrier
© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 10 DSPOnlineConference.com
 Direct Up Conversion (DUC) Transmitter

• Baseband converts to RF directly

• Pros: Simple to implement in an IC, hence popular in cellphones
• Cons: Many possible sources for RF signal impairments

I channel
𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋𝑓𝑚 𝑡

×
~
𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋𝑓𝑐 𝑡 USB USB
-fc-fm -fc 0 fc fc+fm
-fc 0 fc +

+
Bandpass
Carrier RF
90o 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋 𝑓𝑐 + 𝑓𝑚 𝑡
-fm 0 fm
Baseband -
𝑠𝑖𝑛 2𝜋𝑓𝑐 𝑡

Q channel
𝑠𝑖𝑛 2𝜋𝑓𝑚 𝑡
×
© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 11 DSPOnlineConference.com
 Everything went well!

• Time to go home, Right?

• Then, why am I here?
• Lets take a deeper look!

• We know that
• Acos2 2𝜋𝑓𝑐 𝑡 + 𝐴𝑠𝑖𝑛2 2𝜋𝑓𝑐 𝑡 = 𝐴

• What about
• Acos2 2𝜋𝑓𝑐 𝑡 + 𝐵𝑠𝑖𝑛2 2𝜋𝑓𝑐 𝑡 + 𝜃 =?

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 12 DSPOnlineConference.com

 Ideal DUC Transmitter
• An ideal mixer would have
• Identical gains for in-phase and quadrature-phase
• In-phase and quadrature phase are exactly 90degrees apart
• Perfect input to output isolation so that input will not leak into output
• An ideal carrier would have
• Precise frequency
• No phase jitter
• Operates perfectly in wide range of temperature and humidity
• An ideal baseband would have
• No DCoffset
• Can we design such an Ideal DUC Transmitter?
• A very BIG NO, unfortunately or NOT (no job for me if YES )
• What is the reality?

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 13 DSPOnlineConference.com

 Practical DUC Transmitter
• In practice, due to component to component variations in the PCB, it is impossible to manufacture an ideal DUC
Transmitter
• We can try to come as close to ideal DUC Transmitter as possible using various techniques (a completely different
seminar!)

RF = 𝐴 𝛼 + 𝑀𝑖,𝑑𝑐 + 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋𝑓𝑚 𝑡 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋 𝑓𝑐 + 𝑓𝑒 𝑡 + 𝜑 − 𝐴 + 𝜀 𝛽 + 𝑀𝑞,𝑑𝑐 + 𝑠𝑖𝑛 2𝜋𝑓𝑚 𝑡 𝑠𝑖𝑛 2𝜋 𝑓𝑐 + 𝑓𝑒 𝑡 + 𝜃

×
Carrier Leakage
𝑀𝑖,𝑑𝑐 + 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋𝑓𝑚 𝑡
I channel Unwanted LSB (image
Carrier Leakage of the USB)

~ A𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋 𝑓𝑐 + 𝑓𝑒 𝑡 + 𝜑
+
-fc-fe-fm
USB LSB

-fc -fe -fc-fe+fm 0 fc+fe-fm

LSB
fc+fe
USB
fc+fe+fm

+
Carrier frequency error
-fm 0 fm
RF
Baseband 900+θ -
𝐴 + 𝜀 𝑠𝑖𝑛 2𝜋 𝑓𝑐 + 𝑓𝑒 𝑡 + 𝜃

×
𝑀𝑞,𝑑𝑐 + 𝑠𝑖𝑛 2𝜋𝑓𝑚 𝑡 Carrier Leakage

Q channel
Will cause EVM
© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 14 DSPOnlineConference.com
 What are these impairments?
Impairment Symbol What is the impact?

Baseband dcOffset Mi,dc Leak the carrier into RF. Waste of RF energy
Mq,dc
Carrier Frequency Error fe Constellation Rotation

Carrier Phase Jitter φ Increase the bandwidth of the signal

IQ gain imbalance ε Produce image frequency

IQ phase imbalance θ Produce image frequency

Carrier Feedthrough α, β Amount of Carrier leaks into the RF signal. Waste of RF

signal
EVM - Error Vector Magnitude which is a way to measure the
Signal-to-Noise Ratio

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 15 DSPOnlineConference.com

 What is Error Vector Magnitude (EVM)

©Source:
D S P O nGoogle
lineConference.com All rights reserved 16 DSPOnlineConference.com
 Example1: Almost perfect signal

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 17 DSPOnlineConference.com

 Example2: 1KHz Carrier Frequency Error

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 18 DSPOnlineConference.com

 Example3: Add dcOffset

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 19 DSPOnlineConference.com

 Example4: Add gain and phase imbalance

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 20 DSPOnlineConference.com

 Example5: Add all the previous impairments and lower the power

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 21 DSPOnlineConference.com

 How to use RF Measurements?

• Once a device is made in the factory

• Perform measurements to estimate the impairments
• Make necessary corrections using calibration tables
• Redo the measurements to re-estimate the calibrated impairments
• Make sure that the impairments are within the limits as specified in the Wireless
standards
• One can never make the impairments to go away!
• But what can be done is to minimize them!

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 22 DSPOnlineConference.com

 Summary

• SSB is used to reduce the bandwidth and power requirements

• Ideal SSB requires perfect synchronization of the TX/RX
• Perfect TX/RX is not possible in reality due to component tolerances, PCB
layout, manufacturing process etc., which produces RF impairments
• Impairments are not bad as long as they can be measured and
minimized/controlled
• RF measurements are used to measure these impairments and then
calibrate the wireless devices to minimize them
• Calibrated devices are re-measured to verify that the impairments are
within the limits as specified by the Wireless standard

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 23 DSPOnlineConference.com

 Questions???

© DSPOnlineConference.com All rights reserved 24 DSPOnlineConference.com

THANK YOU

w w w . d s p o n l i n e c o n f e r e n c e . c o m
w w w . d s p o n l i n e c o n f e r e n c e . c o m