-119dBc! - RF Cafe Forums

RF Cafe Forums closed its virtual doors in late 2012 mainly due to other social media platforms dominating public commenting venues. RF Cafe Forums began sometime around August of 2003 and was quite well-attended for many years. By 2012, Facebook and Twitter were overwhelmingly dominating online personal interaction, and RF Cafe Forums activity dropped off precipitously. Regardless, there are still lots of great posts in the archive that ware worth looking at. Below are the old forum threads, including responses to the original posts. Here is the full original RF Cafe Forums on Archive.org

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darcyrandall2004

Post subject: -119dBc! Posted: Mon May 19, 2008 8:47 am

Colonel

Joined: Tue Feb 27, 2007 6:16 am

Posts: 46

Hello Its me again,

I was reading an application note that stated that the adjacent channel rejection of a typical pocsag pager was 65dB at +/-25kHz

This places the following restrictions on the phase noise of my paging transmitter:

Assumming a margin of 10dB, the phase noise must be less than or equal to -65dB - 10log(25kHz/1Hz) - 10dB = -119dBc/Hz at 25kHz from the Carrier!

For a PLL, My understanding is that the Output phase noise follows that of the crystal ref for frequencies less than the loop bandwidth and follows that of the VCO for frequencies greater than the loop bandwidth.

Because the channel spacing is 25kHz, I am going to choose a loop bandiwdth << 25kHz/10 to avoid problems with reference spurs. Therefore at 25kHz offset from the carrier, I can assume phase noise output is as a result of the VCO.

Assume I require a VCO that outputs from 440MHz-470MHz. I believe even a state of the art VCO would have trouble achieving -119dBc at 25kHz.

How then are the big boys producing paging transmitters with PLL's that meet these requirements?

Can someone point me in the right direction?

All I can think of is perhaps they:

1. Use multiple small bandwidth VCO's with low phase noise and switch in the right one for the correct frequency.

2. Maybe I can design a low phase noise frequency synth for a lower frequency and then use a mixer with another low noise oscillator to achieve the correct frequency.

3. Perhaps by using a number of PLL's I could assign the last PLL a large channel width, and a large loop bandwidth thereby having the phase noise output still follow the phase noise of a crystal reference.

Do you have any suggestions?

Which approach is typically the easiest and the most common?

Your help is very much appreciated thankyou.

_________________

Regards, Darcy Randall, Perth, Western Australia

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yendori

Post subject: Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 11:43 am

General

Joined: Thu Sep 25, 2003 1:19 am

Posts: 50

Location: texarcana

Is the additional margin really needed? It's my understanding that the phase noise spec @ 35KHz offset is -105dBc/Hz.

I think you can find a VCO to meet this repeatably.

Good Luck,

Rod

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darcyrandall2004

Post subject: Posted: Sat May 24, 2008 4:26 am

Colonel

Joined: Tue Feb 27, 2007 6:16 am

Posts: 46

If I use two PLL's I can absolutely annihilate the 119dBc requirement.

The first loop has an extremely small bandwidth, hence phase noise in this loop is predominantly a result of the 120MHz Crystal VCO.

The second loop has an extremely large bandwidth, hence phase noise in this loop is attributed to the low noise output from the first loop.

I simulated phase noise using typical values and estimated contribution due to the power supplies.

The problem is either I cant calculate the divider values to achieve 25kHz channel spacings or it is just not possible.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

_________________

Regards, Darcy Randall, Perth, Western Australia

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darcyrandall2004

Post subject: Posted: Sun May 25, 2008 7:57 am

Colonel

Joined: Tue Feb 27, 2007 6:16 am

Posts: 46

I solved the choice of divider values problem.

If I use the following parameters I just might be able to achieve the -119dBc requirement.

N1=17600

R1=1023

N2=240

R2=2

Xtal Vco ref 2=3.666666MHz

Xtal Vco ref 1=213125Hz

This sets my loop 1 channel bandwidth to 208.3Hz.

Any suggestions?

_________________

Regards, Darcy Randall, Perth, Western Australia

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RFDave

Post subject: Posted: Mon May 26, 2008 11:05 am

Captain

Joined: Sat Apr 22, 2006 11:14 pm

Posts: 10

Hi:

I've got a couple of comments-

1-10 dB of margin is pretty big, you might want to relax that.

2-Take a look at off the shelf VCO's. I just took a look at Synergy Microwave,

and they have parts that look like they are close to -115 dBc/Hz phase noise

There are quite a few VCO vendors, you might want to look at the ad's here

on rfcafe.

3-You might want to look at packaged VCO/PLL combinations as well.

4-I'd look at Fractional-N PLLs. You lock time with a 200 Hz BW is going to be pretty slow. I'm not sure if a paging transmitter will have the same constraints, but a paging receiver has some pretty stringent lock time requirements to improve battery life.

Dave

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darcyrandall2004

Post subject: Posted: Mon May 26, 2008 10:43 pm

Colonel

Joined: Tue Feb 27, 2007 6:16 am

Posts: 46

Thanks Dave,

Ive just been looking into fractional synthesizers and I believe they will simply the design.

Cheers

_________________

Regards, Darcy Randall, Perth, Western Australia

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RFDave

Post subject: Modulation?Posted: Wed Jun 04, 2008 10:18 pm

Captain

Joined: Sat Apr 22, 2006 11:14 pm

Posts: 10

How are you planning on doing your modulation for this?

Dave

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darcyrandall2004

Post subject: Posted: Mon Jun 09, 2008 6:48 pm

Colonel

Joined: Tue Feb 27, 2007 6:16 am

Posts: 46

I was going to use a technique called two point modulation where I inject the modulation both on the reference oscillator and the VCO at the same time. I read that this will remove any restrictions the loop bandiwdth places on the baud rate I wish to use.

_________________

Regards, Darcy Randall, Perth, Western Australia

Posted  11/12/2012