4.7 GHz Digitizer Cards for Signal Analysis
Spectrum Instrumentation has extended the M5i flagship series of high-speed PCIe digitizers, adding two new models with ultrawide bandwidths that go up to 4.7 GHz for -3 dB attenuation or even 5 GHz for -5 dB attenuation. The models M5i.3360-x16 and M5i.3367-x16 provide one and two channels respectively. Each card is capable of sampling at rates up to 10 GS/s, with 12-bit vertical resolution, specifically designed to deliver the most accurate acquisition and analysis of signals in the GHz range. The high bandwidth, combined with fast sampling, allows signals to be analyzed for frequency content anywhere from DC to the Nyquist limit (half the sample rate, or up to 5 GHz), making them ideal for working with extremely fast signals in laser systems, semiconductor testing, spectroscopy, reflectometry and a wide variety of RF applications.
Oliver Rovini, Chief Technical Officer, said “At 4.7 GHz, these new digitizer cards offer our highest bandwidth capability to date. More bandwidth means less signal attenuation at higher frequencies. It also makes it possible to detect and measure faster pulses and signal edge speeds. As such, bandwidth is critical for any engineer or scientist who wants to measure and characterize high-frequency electronic signals. Our flagship digitizer line, which is based on 12-bit ADC technology, now has seven different models with sampling rates from 3.2 to 10 GS/s and bandwidths from 1 to 4.7 GHz. The range lets our customers choose the performance level that perfectly fits their specific requirements.”
To handle a diversity of input signals, the raw acquisition performance is complimented by flexible front-end circuitry with programmable full-scale ranges, from ±200 mV to ±2.5 V, and input offset. Acquisitions can be stored in a generous 4 GB (2 GSamples) of onboard memory (16 GB or 8 GSamples optional) and transferred over the PCIe bus at the fastest speeds possible. All cards of the M5i series use 16-lane, Gen 3, PCIe technology, which allows the acquired data to be streamed at a staggering 12.8 GB/s. The onboard memory can be used as a ring buffer, working much like a conventional oscilloscope, or fully as a FIFO buffer for continuous data streaming. The data can also be sent to PC memory for storage or directly to CPUs and CUDA-based GPUs for customized signal processing and analysis.
Perfect for automated testing systems, the cards come with all the tools necessary to use them in a PC running either a Windows or Linux operating system. A software development kit (SDK) enables the cards to be programmed with today’s most popular languages, such as C, C++, C#, Delphi, VB.NET, J#, Python, Julia, Java, LabVIEW, and MATLAB. The SDK contains all the required driver libraries as well as numerous programming examples. Alternatively, for users who don’t want to write their own code, the company offers SBench 6 Professional. SBench 6 is a powerful measurement GUI for full card control, with display, analysis, storage, and documentation capabilities. It also includes processing techniques such as FFT’s, for frequency domain analysis, and data interpolation for improved timing measurements.
