New industry standard in nonlinear vector network analysis addresses need for development of quality mobile handsets

The world today is increasingly defined by anytime, anywhere connectivity. Mobile handsets, and the network infrastructure that supports them, are key to consumers' continuous access to voice, video and data services. As mobile communication devices and services grow in popularity, however, so do the challenges engineers face in developing high-quality handsets. To help ensure the quality and reliability of today's mobile handsets, Agilent has announced the availability of a function for its PNA-X microwave network analyzer that provides a new industry standard in nonlinear vector network analysis, a particularly difficult challenge in mobile handset development.

Key to developing quality mobile handsets is the need to create linear active devices for which the relationship between input and output can be plotted on a graph as a straight line. However, in order to develop such devices, engineers must first characterize nonlinear behaviors -- those which do not have a linear input/output relation and are a major contributor to information interference and the reduction in effective bandwidth. All active devices exhibit nonlinear behaviors to varying degrees, so characterizing their impact is critical to the handset development process. Current tools for measuring nonlinear device behavior, however, are difficult to use and often do not provide the information needed.

Agilent's new NVNA capability provides a fast and powerful approach to solving this challenge, enabling characterization of a device's nonlinear behavior with the highest level of accuracy, speed and ease-of-use in the industry. The NVNA capability is based on Agilent's standard PNA-X microwave network analyzer and therefore provides all the power, flexibility and measurement capability of the PNA-X for linear measurements and then can easily switch into the NVNA mode for nonlinear measurements.

Such capabilities make the NVNA a critical tool in helping engineers unlock the full potential of mobile communication devices while providing consumers higher quality handset devices and service.