Applications for SourceXpress® and AWG70000/5200 Series generators

The Tektronix RF Generic application plug-in enhances the capabilities of the SourceXpress® waveform creation platform, and the AWG70000 series and AWG5200 series arbitrary waveform generators, adding the ability to synthesize digitally modulated waveforms.

Key features

• Baseband Analog or Digital IQ, IF and RF/Microwave Signal Generation
  • Synthesize waveforms directly. Apply impairments such as quadrature error and imbalance or non-linear impairments, or add interferences and multipaths during waveform creation.
• Versatile Carrier Signal Generation
  • Create single or Multi-carrier signals where each carrier is independently defined. Also allows for easy addition of modulated analog signals or noise signals.
  • Define and create carrier frequency hopping patterns.
  • Apply a power ramping profile, defined by either a linear or cosine function, to the transmitted signal with control over duration, position and amplitude.
• Support for a Wide Range of Modulation Schemes
  • Define baseband I and Q signals using a variety of predefined modulation schemes such as, BPSK, QPSK, PI/4 QPSK, OQPSK, SDPSK, 8-PSK, O-8PSK, up to QAM1024, GMSK, up to 32-FSK, and analog modulations.
• Support for Custom Modulation
  • Define custom constellation points (IQ Symbols/ Magnitude Phase) or modify pre-defined constellation points.
• Designed with Integration in Mind
  • Programmatic Interface built-in, allowing for immediate integration into existing workflows.
• Offline Mode
  • Capable to run on an external PC via the SourceXpress PC application, thereby reducing the time taken to synthesize large waveforms and leaving the instruments free for continued testing.
• Seamless transition between design and playback

  • The easy to use graphical user interface integrates seamlessly with the user interfaces of the SourceXpress PC application and the Tektronix AWG70000 series and AWG5200 series generators.

Complex RF signals

RF signals are becoming more and more complex, making it more difficult to accurately create the signals required for the testing and characterization of RF systems. To address these challenges, the RF Generic plug-in delivers advanced capabilities to synthesize digitally modulated baseband, IF and RF/microwave signals supporting a wide range of modulation schemes.

Digitally modulated

Signals are easily created with the RF Generic application plug-in. Supporting a wide range of modulation schemes, the software allows users to create standard waveforms or customized waveforms with specific modulation and frequency-hopping criteria. In Auto mode, the software automatically calculates the waveform length and the sampling rate required to accurately create the desired output from the arbitrary waveform generator.

Requirements

• Plug-in installed with SourceXpress on PC:
  • SourceXpress software version 5.3 or greater
  • PC operating systems: Windows 7 (64 bit), Windows 8 (64 bit), Windows 10 (64 bit)
• Plug-in installed on compatible instruments:
  • AWG70000 Series, firmware version 5.3 or greater
  • AWG5200 Series, firmware version 6.0 or greater