Comments
Comments
PXI has had a good run in the second half of 2011 so far. At Semicon West in July, Aeroflex, Geotest, and National Instruments all presented low-cost PXI-based systems (with Aeroflex adding AXIe as well) for semiconductor test applications. I posted earlier about PXI’s prevalence at Autotestcon in September, where Agilent Technologies, Geotest, National Instruments, Pickering Interfaces, Teradyne, and ZTEC Instruments all highlighted PXI products, primarily for military and aerospace applications. The week after Autotestcon, Geotest and ZTEC took their PXI products to the semiconductor-test-centric International Test Conference, where Chroma ATE also displayed PXI-based programmable pin-electronics modules, source-measure units, and programmable power supplies.
And today, National Instruments is highlighting PXI for RF test applications. The company said it is demonstrating a complete PXI-based solution for RF power amplifier (PA) validation and production test at European Microwave Week in Manchester, England.
The NI PXI system for power amplifier test integrates a variety of mixed-signal instruments, including the NI PXIe-5665 14-GHz vector signal analyzer, the NI PXIe-6556 digital per-pin parametric measurement unit (PPMU), the NI PXIe-4154 battery simulator, and the NI PXIe-5186 12.5 GS/s, 5-GHz digitizer. With the instruments, engineers can perform PA tests such as power versus time (PVT), error vector magnitude (EVM), adjacent channel leakage ratio (ACLR), current leakage, harmonics, and open-shorts tests.
PXI’s successful run is likely to continue. Jessy Cavazos, industry director for measurement and instrumentation at Frost & Sullivan, predicts that the compound annual growth rate for modular instruments through 2017 will be 12.2%, propelling market revenues beyond the $1 billion mark to reach $1.172 billion in 2017. And she notes that “PXI/PXI Express is the major force in the modular instruments market.”
Posted 10/11/2011 2:01 PM.