Search Application Notes & Cards
Learn how to configure Rohde & Schwarz products to fit your application. Search our database by product, technology, or application to find relevant technical documents.
Search Application Notes & Cards
Learn how to configure Rohde & Schwarz products to fit your application. Search our database by product, technology, or application to find relevant technical documents.
32 Results
Correct and time-saving parameter configuration thanks to predefined DVB-T2 test configurations in the R&S®SFU broadcast test system
18-Apr-2013
This Application Note introduces the new interferer management option, R&S SFU-K37 and describes how this can be used to generate various types of interfering signals for testing the performance of a receiver.
09-Jan-2007 | AN-No. 7BM50
The Rohde & Schwarz SFU supports several modes of level setting. This Application Note describes the differences between these modes and especially describes a method to achieve a seamless transition without any impact to the output signal during a change of settings on an Rohde & Schwarz SFU (Firmware version > 1.30).
23-Jun-2006 | AN-No. 7BM54
This Application Note briefly explains the theoretical background regarding phase noise before describing the phase noise option for the R&S SFU. You will see how the phase noise profile creator application software can be used to generate specific phase noise curves and how to output them with the aid of the R&S SFU.
22-Aug-2007 | AN-No. 7BM63
The measurement of bit error rate (BER) is an important test procedure for determining the performance of a receiving terminal. This is especially important for set top box and chipset manufacturers who need to know if their product is able to meet the specification under a predefined noise condition. This Application Note describes the technique using an Rohde & Schwarz SFU to measure the BER of digital set top boxes.
19-Dec-2006 | AN-No. 7BM51
DIRECTV®, a digital TV broadcast system, makes use of transport packets with a length of 130 bytes rather than the more common 188 bytes used in MPEG TS streams. The inputs on the R&S® SFU do not accept transport streams in the DIRECTV® format. This Application Note introduces R&S® DIRECTV tool and explains how it can be used to convert existing 130-byte-based DIRECTV® transport stream content to 188-byte-based ISO 13818-1 streams that are compatible with the R&S® SFU SPI input or the internal R&S® SFU TRP player. This tool is intended for Rohde & Schwarz customers who are licensed to operate an R&S® SFU-K9 DIRECTV coder or R&S® SFU-K108 AMC coder.
05-Oct-2007 | AN-No. 7BM69
The R&S®SFU broadcast test system is used as a reference signal generator to simulate the influence of LTE and other mobile radio signals on digital TV signals and receivers.
20-Jun-2012
For customers who have already used automated R&S SFQ setups in development and production, the implementation of the successor instrument results in a need to adjust the SCPI commands formerly used.This document provides an overview on how SCPI commands that are used with the R&S SFQ change with the new test transmitter as well as a cross-reference list in the form of an EXCEL sheet.
23-Jun-2006 | AN-No. 7BM56
Testing the tolerance to phase and impulsive noise is an integral part of quality tests for DVB-T/H and ATSC (8VSB) receivers, and several national and international standards specify guidelines and minimum requirements in this context. This Application Note introduces the R&S SFU-K42 impulsive noise option, the R&S SFU-K41 phase noise option, as well as the R&S SFU-K43 multinoise use option and describes how these can be used for testing the tolerance to phase and impulsive noise on commercial receivers.
26-Jan-2007 | AN-No. 7BM64
Arbitrary waveform generator – this term encapsulates the wide-ranging capabilities and applications that can be provided by user-definable I/Q baseband signals and a vector signalgenerator. Rohde & Schwarz has developed the R&S WinIQSIM™ software package specifically with this in mind. The first questions a user might ask are: “How do the R&S SFU and R&S WinIQSIM™ interwork and what features are available? This Application Note has been produced to answer these questions.
19-Dec-2006 | AN-No. 7BM57
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) ruled that no later than February 17, 2009, all analog NTSC broadcasting must come to an end. It is therefore not surprising that the demand for ATSC receivers is high at the time this application note was published. ATSC TV sets and set-tops are subject to the ATSC recommended practice Doc.A/74 “Receiver Performance Guidelines” before they can be sold freely in the markets that adopted the standard. Although the number of tests defined in Doc.A/74 is less extensive then the ones for their DVB-T counterparts (EN62002, MBRAI), some clarification is nevertheless due.
27-Sep-2012 | AN-No. 7BM71
The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) created the MBRAI specifications, which call for strict conformance tests that ensure the proper functionality of mobile receiver terminals for DVB-T/H transmissions. MBRAI is a common abbreviation of the IEC 62002 standard and stands for “mobile and portable DVB-T/H radio access interface”. This Application Note describes how the Broadcast Test System R&S®SFU provides all functions to generate MBRAI-compliant test signals. Only two special measurements require additional sources. For this purpose, the Test Transmitter R&S®SFE100 is used.
28-Nov-2007 | AN-No. 7BM61
The FLO in MediaFLO stands for 'forward link only'. MediaFLO technology covers transmission of files and multimedia content to handheld devices. The FLO device minimum performance specification (MPS) was created to ensure that FLO receivers can receive a FLO service that fulfils the compatibility guidelines of the FLO air interface specification. This Application Note shows how the Broadcast Test System R&S SFU from Rohde & Schwarz can be used to generate all test scenarios required by the minimum performance specification.
31-Aug-2006 | AN-No. 7BM62
The Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers (SCTE) defined the ANSI/SCTE 40 specification: Digital Cable Network Interface Standard. ANSI/SCTE 40 tests are designed to test conformance of set-top boxes and other cable receiving equipment to ensure that they will operate correctly when installed in a cable system. The tests are a combination of noise (AWGN and phase noise), AM hum, micro-reflections, digital and analog adjacent channels, and other discrete interferences. These impairments are found on most cable systems to some degree. Rohde & Schwarz provides set-top box manufacturers with an easy solution to perform conformance testing in line with ANSI/SCTE 40 by using the R&S®SFU broadcast test system and the R&S®SFE100 broadcast tester. The R&S®SFU is able to perform most of the test procedures in one unit. Furthermore, additional test transmitters allow the simulation of full channel loading. This Application Note explains the specific test requirements, a possible setup, and the configuration using the R&S®SFU/SFE100.
29-Oct-2009 | AN-No. 7BM68
This application note introduces the methods to convert MediaFLO™ waveform files to ARB format to be used with R&S® Broadcast Signal Generators SFx-K35 ARB Generator. R&S® IQWIZARD and WinIQSIM™ software are used, providing a quick and simple file conversion method.
10-Nov-2008 | AN-No. 7BM73
RF physical layer specifications (such as 3GPP TS36.104) describe a variety of requirements that the end equipment needs to meet. This application note provides insight into some of these specifications and how test & measurement equipment can simplify the task of deriving requirements for RF sub-systems.
10-Apr-2013 | AN-No. 1MA221
This Rohde & Schwarz application note provides an introduction into the DVB-H standard at first. It then discusses the test of DVB-H-capable mobile phones in development and production.
07-Apr-2005 | AN-No. 1MA91
Receiver diversity improves reception quality by using multiple antennas with a preferably low correlation factor between each other. This results in a more robust handling of multipath signals, since a deep fade will then not affect all received signals at the same time. However, the compact dimensions of handheld devices can introduce unwanted correlation due to their dense antenna spacing. In this case, the popular diversity test setup consisting of several independent transmitters will no longer serve the needs of a realistic simulation, since correlation effects have to be taken into account here. A clever solution is to operate the R&S®SFU in split-fading mode in combination with a second transmitter. This can be another R&S®SFU, the R&S®SFE, the R&S®SFE100 or the R&S®SMU200A. In this way, two diversity signals of adjustable correlation for any common broadcast standard are coded in realtime, while their individual multipath profile is precisely specified by the extensive features of the R&S®SFU fader module.
19-Oct-2012 | AN-No. 7BM76
This application note describes how the transmitter landscape of a DVB-T2 single-frequency network (SFN) can be simulated in multiple input single output (MISO) mode in order to test the compatibility and performance of receiver modules. Neither an external T2-MI gateway nor a GPS receiver is required - just an R&S®BTC equipped with two RF paths. Alternatively, one R&S®SFU coupled with one or more R&S®SFU, R&S®SFE, R&S®SFE100 or R&S®SFC can also be used. R&S®ETL or R&S®ETC are suggested to fine-tune the synchronization between the generated RF signals.
03-Feb-2014 | AN-No. 7BM80
Rohde & Schwarz instruments can be shared when users wish to use the same instrument. This can be done quite easily with the LAN interface, which comes as a standard option. Through this interface, Rohde & Schwarz instruments can be connected directly to a network, and users with access to the network can manually operate the instrument from a remote computer. This Application Note lists all instruments that support these features and describes the steps necessary to set up and configure the network connection to operate these instruments remotely.
05-Jul-2007 | AN-No. RAC-0703-0029
Version 1.3.1 of the DVB-T2 standard ETSI 302 755 introduced the T2-Lite profile to ease the implementation of mobile TV services. This was achieved by minimizing the complexity of the required receiver and allowing side-by-side integration into existing conventional (T2-Base) DVB-T2 channels. For the purposes of testing the compatibility and performance of receiver modules, this application note describes how this type of composite T2-Base/T2-Lite RF signal can be simulated using one R&S®BTC or alternatively two instruments from the family of broadcast signal generators comprised of the R&S®SFU, R&S®SFE, R&S®SFE100 and R&S®SFC. Only one corresponding multiple profile T2-MI stream is required, either in the form of a file or via an external gateway.
03-Feb-2014 | AN-No. 7BM81
I/Q waveform files contain the digital complex sample values of a radio signal. They can be synthetically computer-calculated for generating precisely defined contents, or they can represent the recording of a received live signal. The structure of these files has never been standardized, which is why so many different formats are in use today. R&S®IQ Converter and R&S®IQ Stream Extractor are programs that quickly and conveniently convert the contents of I/Q waveform files of nearly any structure into the I/Q format used by the R&S®BTC, R&S®CLG, R&S®SLG, R&S®SFU, R&S®SFE and R&S®SFE100 signal generators. This makes it possible for the signal generators to use their integrated ARB function to generate precise RF signals from nearly any I/Q waveform file.
03-Feb-2014 | AN-No. 7BM79
This white paper introduces a novel attribute based architecture for VXIplug&play instrument drivers. The presented architecture uses the attribute based concept of IVI-C instrument drivers to introduce a two-layer design for VXIplug&play instrument drivers. Moreover the use of attributes is shown for the Rohde & Schwarz Spectrum Analyzer (rsspecan) instrument driver.
01-Dec-2012 | AN-No. 1MA170
Noise Power Ratio Signal Generation and Measurement
Noise Power Ratio (NPR) is an add-on tool for WinIQSIM™ to generate noise power ratio stimulus signals and measure the resulting noise power ratio of a device under test (DUT) using Rohde & Schwarz instruments via LAN or GPIB bus.
06-Nov-2015 | AN-No. 1MA29
Spectrum that was previously reserved for TV broadcasting is being freed up in many countries for use under the new Long Term Evolution (LTE) mobile radio standard (keyword: 'digital dividend'). As a result, numerous coexistence scenarios are possible. So network operators and manufacturers from both the mobile radio and the broadcast sector have a vital interest in avoiding any interference and performing in-depth testing of their products. Rohde & Schwarz offers a wideranging product portfolio for such applications. This Application Note presents Test & Measurement equipment for the broadcast and mobile radio sector and discusses some possible test setups.
08-Dec-2011 | AN-No. 1MA176
The use of Rohde & Schwarz device drivers under VEE software is not complicated. However, a number of factors are involved, the errors that occur are often difficult to diagnose. This application provides easy and detailed support for installation and troubleshooting using National Instruments or Agilent GPIB boards.
20-Dec-2012 | AN-No. 1MA035
Wide range of set-top box tests in line with current DVB-xx standards using a variable, future-ready test system
13-Jul-2012
The R&S®BTC broadcast test center generates DVB-C2 signals for receiver tests with a variety of simulated interference types. The selection tests stipulated by the DVB Project require a cable TV network with full channel load. Combining the R&S®BTC broadcast test center and the R&S®CLG cable load generator makes it quick and easy to create a flexible cable TV network with full channel load and to simulate all types of realistic interference, permitting tests in accordance with DVB.
30-Jul-2013 | AN-No. 7BM88
Miloslav Macko 1MA196 1MA196, Forum, Instrument, Remote, Control, Python, R&S Forum, RS Forum, R&SForum, RSForum R&S®Forum for Instrument Remote Control Using R&S®Forum Application for Instrument Remote Control Miloslav Macko 1MA196 1MA196, Forum, Instrument, Remote, Control, Python, R&S Forum, RS Forum, R&SForum, RSForum R&S®Forum for Instrument Remote Control Related products
28-Jun-2018 | AN-No. 1MA196
When installed on an Apple iPad*, a remote desktop app provides a convenient way to remotely control measuring instruments over a WLAN connection.This is especially helpful when using measuring instruments that do not have their own display such as the R&S®VTS or R&S®SFC.The remote desktop app also gives users a detached way to control the instrument if, for example, the actual measuring instrument is installed in a place that is difficult to access.* Apple and iPad are trademarks of Apple Inc.
02-Oct-2012 | AN-No. 7BM82