TI Compact Analog Front End Reduces Volume

Yesterday's news, Texas Instruments announced two new small analog front ends (AFEs) supporting low power and high performance for measurement and test, wireless communications, and optical networking equipment. The AFE7071 is a complete radio transmitter that can reduce board space by up to 80% compared to discrete implementations. It integrates a dual channel digital-to-analog converter (DAC), a tunable baseband filter, an IQ modulator, and a quadrature modulation correction circuit. The AFE7070 adds a Direct Digital Synthesizer (DDS) that supports a 32-bit numerically controlled oscillator (NCO) and an LVDS output buffer.

The main features and advantages of AFE7070 and AFE7071:

• Highly integrated: A single device provides dual 14-bit 65 MSPS DACs, programmable low-pass filters, and RF IQ modulators, supporting RF output ranges from 100 MHz to 2700 MHz, simplifying design and reducing board space;

• Small size: 7mm x 7mm package supporting multiplexed CMOS inputs, 80% smaller than typical discrete solutions, enabling small or mobile designs such as small cell base stations and portable measurement test equipment;

• Highly flexible RF output: These devices have a tunable range of 100 MHz to 2700 MHz, output power up to 0.3 dBm, adjustable frequency, and maximum system flexibility;

• High performance, low power consumption: At 2.1 GHz, the adjacent channel power ratio is 66 dB for 5 MHz WCDMA and 61 dB for 20 MHz LTE, and the power consumption is only 325 mW, which is 50 lower than the stand-alone solution. %the above;

• Low output noise level: 156 dBm/Hz for high quality signals.

AFE7070 more features and advantages:

• Small, Low Cost: Direct Digital Synthesis of 32-Bit NCO and LVDS Output Buffers Supports Frequency Conversion, Enables Small Designs by Reducing the Number of Interface Lines and Components, and Provides a Low-Cost Method for Optical Timing Tuning and Arbitrary Waveform Generation ;

• Simplified design: The integrated 800MHz LVDS output can be used as a phase-locked loop (PLL) pre-driver permutator without the need for a separate analog-to-LVDS converter;

• Configurable digital input: Accepts 14-bit complex values ​​or 16-bit NCO phase values ​​as input data for constant amplitude modulation.

Tools and evaluation boards supporting both devices are available now. The AFE7070EVM and AFE7071EVM include CDCM7005 clock jitter cleaners, TI power management devices such as DC/DC converters and low-noise LDOs to provide a complete bit-to-RF prototyping and reference design.

The AFE7070 and AFE7071 IBIS models have also been provided to meet the board signal integrity requirements.

In addition, designers can use the TSW3065EVM as a highly flexible local oscillator to drive the AFE7070 and AFE7071. It contains a PLL/VCO TRF3765 that supports a tunable range of 300 MHz to 4800 MHz.

The TI E2ETM community's high-speed data converter forum provides engineers with technical support and TI expert consultation.

Availability and packaging The AFE7070 and AFE7071 are currently available in 7mm x 7mm QFN packages.