Session

Technical Session IX: Advanced Technologies II

Abstract

Power supply designs are often overlooked as part of a high-frequency electronic system. A wide range of approaches are used and many of these power designs simply don’t work as well as they should. These power supply designs perform poorly for a number of technical reasons, and it may be helpful examine these issues. Key performance requirements, such as stability, regulation, ripple, and headroom are often overlooked and not properly met. To ensure these performance criteria are addressed, design engineers require more complete data sheets, appropriate computer-aided simulation models, and suitable test equipment. In many designs, the same power supply, usually consisting of a converter and various linear regulators and POLs, is used to feed various RF and digital loads. Increasing device speeds can cause transient edges of load currents are becoming more difficult to ignore reaching switching speeds of hundreds of picoseconds. Regulators have also increased in speed, reaching bandwidths up to 10 MHz which this makes a standard 2-MHz network analyzer under-equipped to measure voltage regulators. As a result, power electronics engineers may find themselves struggling with RF engineering issues. This paper is aimed at identifying these issues through a mix of new and existing power supply measurement techniques.

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Aug 15th, 4:30 PM

Ensuring Clean Power for RF and Digital Applications

Power supply designs are often overlooked as part of a high-frequency electronic system. A wide range of approaches are used and many of these power designs simply don’t work as well as they should. These power supply designs perform poorly for a number of technical reasons, and it may be helpful examine these issues. Key performance requirements, such as stability, regulation, ripple, and headroom are often overlooked and not properly met. To ensure these performance criteria are addressed, design engineers require more complete data sheets, appropriate computer-aided simulation models, and suitable test equipment. In many designs, the same power supply, usually consisting of a converter and various linear regulators and POLs, is used to feed various RF and digital loads. Increasing device speeds can cause transient edges of load currents are becoming more difficult to ignore reaching switching speeds of hundreds of picoseconds. Regulators have also increased in speed, reaching bandwidths up to 10 MHz which this makes a standard 2-MHz network analyzer under-equipped to measure voltage regulators. As a result, power electronics engineers may find themselves struggling with RF engineering issues. This paper is aimed at identifying these issues through a mix of new and existing power supply measurement techniques.