Wireless multi-standard terminals: System analysis and design of a reconfigurable RF front-end

被引:52
作者
University of Ferrara, Italy [1 ]
不详 [2 ]
不详 [3 ]
不详 [4 ]
不详 [5 ]
机构
[1] Studio di Microelettronica, Pavia
[2] IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, NY
[3] IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, NY
来源
IEEE Circuits Syst. Mag. | 2006年 / 1卷 / 38-57期
关键词
D O I
10.1109/MCAS.2006.1607637
中图分类号
学科分类号
摘要
The availability of multi-standard terminals will be key to provide location independent connections able to take advantage of any possible infrastructure. This paper addresses both the architecture and the circuits for the RF front-end of a terminal with cellular (GSM, EDGE and UMTS), LAN (IEEE802.11a/b/g) and Blue-tooth radio interfaces. A multi-standard simulator has been developed to validate the architectural and design choices in terms of error rates at bit or packet level. The simulator takes into account implementation non-idealities and performs all tests to be passed to comply with the given standards. It also hints at the need for implementation margins as well as at possible optimization between different RF-blocks. The final solution, still under design, will consists of two chips, one including the TX and the other the RX for all the above standards. The cellular (plus Blue-tooth) transmitter relies on a Linear amplification with Non-linear Component (LINC) architecture that uses direct modulation of the carrier. This allows power saving because DAC and up-conversion mixers are not reguired. The WLAN (plus BlueTooth) transmitter adopts a direct-conversion architecture that implements an internal output matching over all the freguency bands while maintaining good system efficiency. The same building blocks are used for all standards, saving power and chip area. The cellular receiver architecture is able to reconfigure between Low-IF for GSM and direct conversion for UMTS and Blue-tooth. The key aspects in achieving the specs in a fully integrated fashion are a mixer with a very high dynamic range, a careful control of DC offsets and a highly tunable VCO. The WLAN receiver also uses direct-conversion with a Low Noise Amplifier based on a common gate topology that uses positive feedback through integrated transformers to improve input matching and noise. The freguency down-converter uses current driven passive mixers to achieve low 1/f noise corner, and high linearity with low power consumption. Finally, the base-band blocks can be shared among all the standard, thanks to their high reconfigurability. The paper describes the ideas behind the key RF blocks and some details of circuit implementation. Experimental measurements from sub-blocks in a 0.13 μm CMOS technology are presented and discussed. © 2006 IEEE.
引用
收藏
页码:38 / 57
页数:19
相关论文
共 22 条
[1]  
Yoshimoto S., Yamamoto Y., Takahashi Y., Otsuka E., Multi-band RF SAW filter for mobile phone using surface mount plastic package, IEEE Ultrasonics Symposium, pp. 113-118, (2002)
[2]  
Saleh A.A.M., Frequency-independent and frequency-dependent nonlinear models of TWT amplifiers, IEEE Trans. Communications, COM-29, pp. 1715-1720, (1981)
[3]  
Adiseno, Ismail M., Olsson H., A wide-band RF front-end for multiband multistandard high-linearity low-IF wireless receivers, IEEE Journal of Solid State Circuits, 37, 9, pp. 1162-1168, (2002)
[4]  
Darabi H., Et al., A 2.4 GHz CMOS transceiver for bluetooth, IEEE Journal of Solid State Circuits, 36, 12, pp. 2016-2024, (2001)
[5]  
Brandolini M., Rossi P., Sanzogni D., Svelto F., A CMOS direct down-converter with +78 dBm minimum IIP2 for 3G cell-phones, International Solid-state Circuits Conference, 2005 Proceedings, 1, pp. 320-321, (2005)
[6]  
Liscidini A., Brandolini M., Sanzogni D., Castello R., A 0.13 μm CMOS Front-End for DCS1800/UMTS/802.11b-g with Multi-band Positive Feedback Low Noise Amplifier, VLSI Symposia 2005 Proceedings, 1, pp. 406-409, (2005)
[7]  
Guermandi D., Tortori P., Franchi E., Gnudi A., A 0.75 to 2.2 GHz continuously-tunable quadrature VCO, International Solid-state Circuits Conference, 2005 Proceedings, 1, pp. 536-537, (2005)
[8]  
Temporiti E., Albasini G., Bietti I., Castello R., Colombo M., A 700 kHz bandwidth la fractional synthesizer with spurs compensation and linearization techniques for WCDMA applications, IEEE Journal of Solid State Circuits, 39, 9, pp. 1446-1454, (2004)
[9]  
Lee S.T., Fang S.J., Allstot D.J., Bellaouar A., Fridi A.R., Fontaine P.A., A quad-band GSM-GPRS transmitter with digital auto-calibration, IEEE Journal of Solid State Circuits, 39, 12, pp. 2200-2214, (2004)
[10]  
Hashemi H., Hajimiri A., Concurrent dual band CMOS low noise amplifiers and receiver architectures, VLSI Symposia 2001 Proceedings, 1, pp. 247-250, (2001)