RF Converters Enable Efficient Multiband Radios For Next-Generation Wireless Base Stations

By John Oates, Analog Devices, Inc.

To support rising wireless data demand, modern base station radios are being designed to support multiple E-UTRA bands, as well as carrier aggregation techniques. These multiband radios employ next-generation, GSPS RF ADCs and DACs that allow frequency agile, direct RF signal synthesis, and sampling techniques. To deal with the sparse nature of the RF wireless spectrum, sophisticated DSP is used to efficiently process the data bits to RF and back again. This application note describes an example of a direct RF transmitter for multiband application, considering DSP configurations and power vs. bandwidth trade-off. Download the full paper for more information.