Aeroflex announced the addition of new communications standards to its PXI 3000 Series modular test platform, now enabling communications test engineers to address a variety of 2G and 3G wireless data standards with a single, flexible, software-defined system.
With the addition of the new Bluetooth measurement suite and the new WLAN, and CDMA2000/1xEVDO plug-ins for the PXI Studio software application as well as significant upgrades to the WiMAX, UMTS and GSM/EDGE measurement suites, the PXI 3000 Series is one of the most versatile and far-reaching communications test applications available.
“With these new and updated measurement suites, our extremely flexible PXI offering demonstrates how adept it is at addressing changing market requirements as technology shifts,” said Tim Carey, PXI product manager, Aeroflex. "The PXI 3000 Series is a truly software-defined, scalable and compact platform that addresses emerging and legacy wireless data standards with the same hardware, making it possible for one low-cost, reconfigurable test system to meet all of your wireless testing needs."
All measurement suites are supported by Aeroflex’s PXI Studio application software for easy manual operation with versatile measurement displays to facilitate test system integration as well as testing and problem solving in production and R&D.
About the New and Updated PXI Measurement Suites
Bluetooth Signal Analysis—Enabling characterization of Bluetooth and Bluetooth enhanced data-rate (EDR) radio signals in accordance with the requirements of 2008 Bluetooth Specifications 1.2/2.0/2.0 + EDR/2.1/2.1 + EDR revision 2.1E1, the new Bluetooth measurement suite enables fast measurement of all signal characteristics including burst power, spectrum and modulation accuracy.
CDMA2000 and 1xEVDO Reverse Link—Designed for PXI-based RF test systems used in the development and manufacturing of mobile radio transmitters, sub-modules and RFICs (radio frequency integrated circuits), the new CDMA2000 and 1xEVDO reverse link measurement suite from Aeroflex enables precise characterization of CDMA2000 rev C and 1xEVDO rev A reverse link transmissions. The new release now features phase and amplitude error measurements accessible from within the PXI Studio plug-in.
WLAN—The new WLAN Measurement Suite adds support for IEEE 802.11a/b/g with data rates and corresponding modulation and encoding formats up to 54 Mb/s. DSSS-OFDM support is now available along with new measurements including carrier leak, skew and gain imbalance. In conjunction with the appropriate hardware configuration, this measurement suite is ideal for testing smart phones, which are now rapidly proliferating with dual cellular and WLAN connectivity. It tests multiple standards in parallel, which greatly reduces test time.
GSM/EDGE—The GSM/EDGE Measurement Suite simplifies programming and integration of PXI into automated test applications for GSM handsets/devices and has been updated to include an increased frequency lock range to 300 kHz, making it possible to test terminal transmissions even while unsynchronized to a down link (DL) signal.
UMTS Uplink—The UMTS Uplink Measurement Suite is designed to perform high-speed RF measurements on UE radio transceivers, sub-assemblies and RF components during R&D, design verification, manufacturing test and quality control and now supports phase discontinuity, IQ skew, gain imbalance, carrier leak and phase/amplitude error. When used with PXI 302xC, it now supports receiver bit-error rate (BER) sensitivity testing in loopback and “drive to level,” making it possible to control the device under test (DUT) output power from the tester.
WiMAX—The WiMAX Measurement enables WiMAX PHY (physical layer), Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) power, spectrum and modulation measurements in accordance with IEEE 802.16e (2005). The updates to this suite include user-defined SEM, and expanded modulation measurements including IQ skew, gain imbalance and carrier leak.
