Fast stream

today introduced what it describes as the industry's first software tool that provides fast waveform creation for the design and verification of Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) ultra-wideband (UWB) transceivers and components. Signal Studio for multiband OFDM UWB produces waveforms compliant with the Multiband OFDM Alliance (MBOA) proposal for 802.15.3a.

Agilent says Ultra-wideband (UWB) is an RF technology offering low-power, high-speed data transmission (400 to 500 Mbps) over a short range (approximately five metres). This new personal area network (PAN) technology is said to be ideal for applications where very-high-speed wireless data transfer is required, such as streaming video.

Signal Studio for multiband OFDM UWB enables designers to generate accurate and standard-compliant UWB signals when used with the Agilent E8267D PSG vector signal generator and a wideband arbitrary waveform generator.

The software's flexibility reportedly facilitates thorough receiver performance verification that requires full control of the OFDM UWB transmit waveform, including encoding, interleaving, preamble, header and payload. The software lets the designer get started quickly without first learning how to use complex test equipment. This enables users to focus on the evaluation of the UWB transceiver and perform key measurements, such as sensitivity and interference rejection.