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Recommendations on low phase noise synthesizer - RF Cafe Forums

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NJKirchner
 Post subject: Recommendations on low phase noise synthesizer
Posted: Mon Dec 28, 2009 8:58 pm 
 
Captain
User avatar

Joined: Mon Dec 28, 2009 8:27 pm
Posts: 5
I'm looking around for recommendations on a basic CW functionality, extremely low phase noise synthesizer.

The Holzworth HS1001C is almost a perfect fit but alternative recommendations are what I'm looking to the RF Cafe brain trust for. :study:
http://www.holzworth.com/synthesizers.htm

The Holzworth fits the ticket due to it's outstanding phase noise, compact nature and software driven interface.
-120dBc/Hz @ 1G @10k offset or better is what I'm looking for.
Frequency ranges 10M -1G

So.... any recommendations?

-Norm Kirchner
RF Systems Engineer
National Instruments
 
   
 
d_erickson
 Post subject: Re: Recommendations on low phase noise synthesizer
Posted: Thu Dec 31, 2009 2:26 pm 
 
Lieutenant

Joined: Thu Dec 31, 2009 2:23 pm
Posts: 1
How about the Agilent E8663D-UNX.
-130 dBc/Hz @ 1 GHz, 10 KHz offset
 
   
 
NJKirchner
 Post subject: Re: Recommendations on low phase noise synthesizer
Posted: Thu Jan 07, 2010 11:30 am 
 
Captain
User avatar

Joined: Mon Dec 28, 2009 8:27 pm
Posts: 5
d_erickson wrote:
How about the Agilent E8663D-UNX.
-130 dBc/Hz @ 1 GHz, 10 KHz offset


I would call that the definition of overkill to the extreme.

Any other takers?
 
   
 
windfreak
 Post subject: Re: Recommendations on low phase noise synthesizer
Posted: Tue Jan 12, 2010 7:54 pm 
 
Lieutenant

Joined: Tue Jan 12, 2010 7:47 pm
Posts: 2
This has a phase noise of better than 0.4 degrees integrated from 100Hz to 1MHz. A very rough rule of thumb says that you can use that for a phase modulation with greater than 10 times that angle (4 degrees). Its very cheap: $250.
http://www.windfreak.net/Tech.htm
 
   
 
NJKirchner
 Post subject: Re: Recommendations on low phase noise synthesizer
Posted: Tue Jan 12, 2010 8:16 pm 
 
Captain
User avatar

Joined: Mon Dec 28, 2009 8:27 pm
Posts: 5
Windfreak,

Thanks for the thought, but that device doesn't hit either the frequency range or the phase noise requirements we're looking for.
The VCO on that part has a 10k SSB phase noise of -89dBC at 2.2GHz that's worlds and worlds away from the -120 I'm on the hunt for.

To clarify what I'm trying to do a little I'll give some more detail.

Currently our PXI-5663 has pretty good phase noise performance by taking advantage of the PXI-5652. The 5663 is actually 3 different PXI modules cabled together (LO PXI-5662, Downconverter PXI-5601, IF Digitizer PXI-5622).

Because of it's modular nature, we can substitute our LO with a different LO with even better phase noise performance when the measurements call for it. Just one of those 'Damn, that's sweet!' kind of capabilities you get with a Modular Instrument approach to RF test.




Posted  11/12/2012

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