USB power sensors eliminate the need for a traditional power meter. These highly accurate, standalone instruments communicate with a PC via USB or with a handheld instrument. These sensors measure true RMS power, making them ideal for measuring CW, modulated RF waveforms (ex. 3G, 4G, and OFDM signals), and multi-tone signals with input signals up to 150W/300W peak.

Wideband peak power meters are built to provide accurate measurements and address the important issues of power control, peak power, and timing. Different models of microwave USB power sensors conduct accurate modulated power measurements on many types of signals including, but not limited to, WCDMA, LTE, and WLAN. These devices are compatible with handheld instruments and may be used in many wireless, communications, and aerospace applications.

Pulse power meters offer a comprehensive range of power measurement, measuring a rate of 1 GS/s and 65 MHz bandwidth essential for calculating narrow fast rising edge pulse power measurements used to measure radar signals.

Remote Control of USB Peak Power Sensors

USB Peak Power Sensors can easily be configured for remote monitoring within your local network. Remote connections are ideal for various remote monitoring applications such as EMI/EMC testing, particle accelerators, and satellite systems, where sensors need to be placed at different locations within the same facility. Utilizing a standard Ethernet- or Wi-Fi-to-USB sharing device to connect all remote sensors and PCs to the same local subnet, the remote sensor can be controlled and monitored from a central location using the Peak Power Analyzer software provided by Anritsu.

USB Peak Power Sensors

With industry-leading rise time and video bandwidth (VBW) of up to 195 MHz, the USB peak power sensor MA24400A family of sensors is able to measure the peak power of wideband modulated signals (i.e., 802.11ac) as well as pulses as narrow as 10 ns.

This USB peak power sensor family also offers real-time processing of power readings – never missing a signal to process captured data. Sampling rates of 100 megasamples per second continuous and 10 gigasamples per second effective provides best-in-class time resolution of 100 ps and the ability to measure 2 ns rise time. Even the smallest change in the signal will be caught and plotted for a full picture of signal behavior.

Universal USB Power Sensors

The MA24208A and MA24218A Microwave Universal USB Power Sensors have the fastest overall measurement speeds of any USB sensors in their class (>1,600 readings/s continuous and >11,000 readings/s buffered), enabling you to test the same amount of points in much less time. Therefore, you can speed up your measurements and reduce your costs without sacrificing accuracy and quality. Furthermore, with the best damage protection available (up to +30 dBm CW and +34 dBm peak at <10 μs), you’ll decrease your likelihood of instrument failure and downtime.

Microwave CW USB Power Sensors

The MA243x0A series Microwave CW USB Power Sensors employ a single-path diode architecture to provide fast, accurate average power measurements from 10 MHz up to 50 GHz with 90 dB of dynamic range.

True RMS USB Power Sensors

Keep your system up and running longer with an inline, bi-directional, peak power sensor. Measure a wide variety of signals from CW to LMR, TETRA, APCO/ P25 to cellular (3G and 4G/WiMAX), to tactical military radar and avionics through either the PowerXpert™ PC software or a software option on industry leading Anritsu handheld products. Measurements are made easy for any test skill level.

Operation with Personal Computer (PC)*
The power sensor can be used with a personal computer running Microsoft® Windows via USB. It comes with the Anritsu PowerXpert application (version 2.11 or greater) for data display, analysis, and sensor control. The software provides a front panel display making the personal computer appear like a traditional power meter. The application has many features – like data logging, power versus time graphing, and inclusion of an offset – that enable quick and accurate measurements.

Rugged for Field Use
The MA24106A power sensor provides lab performance accuracy in a rugged and portable field solution. Measurement accuracy over a wide temperature range is maintained by internally stored calibration factors with temperature compensation, thus making it perfect for base station installation and maintenance applications. Field and service technicians will appreciate the small size and light weight as they can carry it in their shirt pocket or laptop case. A very easy to use PC application with a large display makes operation straightforward for users with limited training. The high damage level (+33 dBm) and ESD protection (3.3 kV) provides ruggedness to this high-performance sensor. Since the MA24106A is a low-power device, laptop battery life is preserved.

Dual-Path Architecture Provides True-RMS Measurements
The MA24108A, MA24118A, and MA24126A USB Power Sensors are designed to provide accurate average power measurements from 10 MHz to 26 GHz over 60 dB of dynamic range. The sensors employ a “dual path” architecture that provides True-RMS measurements over the entire frequency and dynamic range (similar to thermal sensor), enabling users to make highly accurate average power measurements for CW, multi-tone, and digitally modulated signals up to 26 GHz.

Highly accurate modulation measurements are facilitated by keeping the diode detectors in the “square law region” and by choosing the output of the appropriate detector path. A built-in attenuator provides excellent SWR performance, thus minimizing mismatch error. The sensor has built-in external trigger (in addition to a software based internal trigger) circuitry with an MCX connector interface to receive trigger from external stimuli for reliable analysis of very complex timeslot configurations. The presence of a micro-controller along with signal conditioning circuitry, ADC, and power supply in the sensor makes it a complete miniature power meter. All calibration factors, as well as linearity and temperature corrections, are stored inside the sensor. To ensure high accuracy, the standards that are used to calibrate this sensor are directly traceable to the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and periodic calibrations are supported by Anritsu service centers worldwide.

Power Meters

Anritsu offers a comprehensive range of power meters. The ML2490A series has the performance required for narrow, fast rising-edge, pulse power measurements (e.g. radar). The ML2480B series is suited for wide-band power measurements on signals such as LTE, W-CDMA, WLAN, and WiMAX. The ML2430A series of power meters are designed for CW applications, offering a combination of accuracy, speed, and flexibility in a low cost package.

Wideband Peak Power Meters

Many operational radars are equipped with special test ports that provide low power outputs suitable for monitoring the performance of the transmitter or transmitter modules. This test port can be used to measure the pulse power.

WLAN 802.11
There are three different variants of WLAN: 802.11b and g, which operate in the 2.4GHz ISM band; and 802.11a, which operates in the 5GHz ISM band. A variety of data rates and modulation techniques are used to encode data rates varying from 1Mb/s to 54Mb/s. All of these systems use Time Division Duplexing and the data is transmitted in frames of variable length. The IEEE standard also specifies several test modes with fixed times and duty cycle rates, however many manufacturers choose to test the transmitters under their own proprietary test signal.

802.11b
The 802.11b transmitter uses Binary Phase Shift Keying (BPSK) or Quadrature Phase Shift Keying (QPSK). The transitions and hence trajectory of the power envelope from one state to the next will determine the peak-to-average power ratio.

802.11a and g
The 802.11 a and g transmitters can use a variety of modulation techniques and data rates. Both systems employ Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM). In this system, the signal is split into 48 separate data sub-carriers (there are also 4 additional pilot carriers) with a correspondingly lower data rate on each carrier. The advantage of this system is that it reduces errors introduced by multi-path propagation at high data rates. Systems based on OFDM can offer higher data rates or longer range at lower data rates compared with conventional single carrier systems. A variety of modulation schemes are used to convey the data ranging from BPSK at the lowest data rate to 64QAM at 54Mb/s.

The peak power has a significant effect on the design of the power amplifier in the transmitter. It is important to accurately test the peak power to ensure that the transmitter is not over-compressing and distorting the transmitter signal. This could lead to higher error rates and lower overall performance of the WLAN signal. It is also important to calibrate the power loop that dynamically controls the power output of the WLAN transmitter. Many transmitters have to co-exist with each other and accurate control of the power is required to do this. A power meter offers the most accurate means of measuring power, which ensures an accurately calibrated WLAN system supporting the highest number of users.

Power amplifiers designed for peak applications, whether pulsed or CDMA, cannot operate at full peak power under CW test conditions. The gain and output power can only be measured accurately using a peak power meter under representative conditions.

For the precise characterization of amplifier output power and gain, the ML2438A/88B/96A power meters are true dual channel meters, with two independent signal channels that eliminate the need for multiplexing. Gain and output power are measured simultaneously. Fast responding diode sensors respond immediately to changes in power level to reduce total test time.

With the ML2496A and ML2488B, users can also make power-added efficiency (PAE) measurements. The amplifier bias voltage can be entered manually or over GPIB and the bias current can be measured using a current probe connected directly to the power meter.

Pulse Power Meters

Radar Systems
The high bandwidth and sample rate of the ML2480B and ML2490A provide accurate peak measurements on a variety of radar, radio-navigation, and radio-location systems.

The ML2480B and ML2490A series have a number of features tailored for peak power measurement on pulsed systems. With a typical 8 ns rise-time and a 1ns resolution on the measurement, the ML2490A and MA2411B power sensor have the performance to look at the rising-edge of radar signals.

Another benefit of the power meter is that it can be easily set up to trigger on a pulse or sequence of pulses. Users can set up to four independent gates to measure the average, max, and min powers on a sequence of pulses. The data for the max and min includes the timestamp and gives the user automatic display of the position and value of the maximum overshoot and minimum undershoot in each pulse.

*Host Operating System (PowerXpert version 2.11 compatibility): Microsoft® Windows Vista, Windows® 7, Windows® XP, and Windows® 2000.