Peregrine Semiconductor Corp of San Diego, CA, USA, a fabless provider of radio-frequency integrated circuits (RFICs) based on silicon-on-sapphire (SOS), says that its PE42720 75-Ohm RF switch is now available for broadband cable systems. Manufactured on Peregrine's UltraCMOS technology, the HaRP-enhanced single-pole, double-throw (SPDT) switch features high linearity, leading isolation performance and excellent video feedthrough, a combination that the firm says supports higher data rates in cable modem termination systems (CMTS), multi-service headends, cable television (CATV) optical transceivers, fiber hubs, optical network terminals, and CATV amplifier modules.
Optimized for high linearity and isolation performance, the PE42720 supports increasing data rates as required by the industry transition to DOCSIS 3.1. High linearity minimizes distortion in the cable network to support new modulation schemes such as 4096-QAM, while the ability to support high isolation between RF ports minimizes unwanted signal interference. This combination is critical as DOCSIS 3.1 relies on orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) to improve spectral efficiency, allowing a 50% increase in data rates up to 10Gb/s downstream and 1Gb/s upstream.
"As the cable television market moves to OFDM to increase data rates, manufacturers will need to make improvements in efficiency in all parts of the system by reducing noise, intermodulation distortions, and ingress," said Mark Schrepferman, director of the commercial and industrial product line with Peregrine's High performance Solutions business unit. "Peregrine has been supporting these requirements for years in the wireless markets, and we are pleased to bring the exceptional linearity and isolation performance that can only be achieved using Peregrine's UltraCMOS technology and HaRP enhancements to broadband cable applications."
The new switch features high isolation performance of at least 60dB across the entire broadband frequency range of 5MHz to 3GHz (65dB at 1GHz (typ) and 64dB at 2GHz). The device features excellent video feedthrough of 5mVpp for reduced distortion, and delivers low insertion loss (0.7dB @ 1GHz and 0.8dB @ 2GHz), which enhances overall system performance by reducing RF path noise figure. In addition, high linearity with a CTB/CSO of -104dBc improves dynamic range of CATV systems. The PE42720 supports 1.8V and 3.3V control logic and ESD performance of 2500V HBM on all ports.
Peregrine Semiconductor has also announced availability of the PE42720 Evaluation Kit.
The PE42720 is available now in volume production, supplied in a 4mm x 4mm 20-lead LGA package priced at $1.06 in 10K quantity orders. Samples and volume-production quantities can be ordered.
