New-Tech Europe | June 2017

customer’s intended application – or worse, it may include a part that achieves marginal performance relative to the requirement. For example, a published spec table shows 11 dB typical gain for Mini- Circuits’ PGA-103+ high-dynamic-range MMIC amplifier, which is specified from 50 to 4000 MHz. In reality, the model’s gain curve exhibits a negative slope when plotted over frequency as shown in figure 1. Notice that characteristic gain performance is greater than the 11 dB spec up to 1500 MHz. Therefore a customer working in an application at lower frequencies with a 13 dB minimum gain requirement may falsely dismiss this model as a viable option if he bases his search onthe spec alone. Specs may offer a convenient general point of reference, but they are, by nature, reductive. Nevertheless, this is the methodology most RF component search engines employ. Such search engines may still be preferable to manually poring over dozens of datasheets, tables, and charts, but they should be approached with healthy skepticism toward the accuracy and completeness of the results they return.

information is widely available on product datasheets and supplier websites, and most parametric search engines for RF components match customer performance criteria against these figures. The problem with this approach is that in reality, electrical performance is not a single value but a variable dependent on frequency. For products

specified over a wide frequency range, the spec may understate or overstate performance within a particularbandto better approximate performance over the product’s full rated frequency range. If the customer only intends to use the product within a specificband, searching by performance specs alonemay reject a part that actually provides ideal performance for the

Figure 1: Characteristic gain performance for Mini-Circuits PGA- 103+ high-dynamic-range MMIC amplifier.

Figure 2: Yoni2 Search for a surface mount amplifier with 13 dB minimum gain from 50 to 1000 MHz

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