GRF5506 power amplifier has low native linearity for 5G infrastructure
The second InGaP HBT power amplifier released by Guerrilla RF provides 24dBm of output power. The GRF5506 is designed for cellular applications requiring exceptional native linearity over temperature extremes, says Guerilla RF.
The GRF5506 is the second of 10 0.25W linear power amplifiers that will be released by the company this year and early 2021 as the company expands into the cellular market.
The InGaP HBT amplifiers were designed specifically for 5G/4G wireless infrastructure applications requiring exceptional native linearity over temperature extremes of -40 to +85 degrees C.
The GRF5506 has a frequency range of 660 to 720MHz and is tuned to operate within the n12, n28, n71 and n83 5G new radio (NR) bands. The power amplifier can deliver over 24dBm of linear power over the entire temperature range while maintaining adjacent channel leakage ration (ACLR) levels of better than -45dBc, intermodulation (IMD3) levels of less than -23dBm, error vector magnitude (EVM) levels less than one per cent and power added efficiencies (PAE) greater than 15 per cent. These are achieved without the aid of supplemental linearisation schemes like digital pre-distortion (DPD), points out Guerrilla RF.
The ability to beat the -45dBc ACLR performance metric without DPD is critical for cellular applications like home and commercial repeaters or boosters, femto cells, pico cells and cable loss compensators associated with automotive so-called shark fin antennae. In each of these use cases, the sensitivity to cost, power and size constraints prohibits the use of elaborate linearisation techniques like DPD, meaning that designers must rely on the power amplifier’s native linearity to meet the stringent emissions mask requirements imposed by the latest 5G and 4G standards.
Guerrilla RF designed the entire GRF55xx family of devices to be footprint-compatible, enabling its customer base to rapidly customise their designs for a myriad of cellular frequencies.
The GRF55xx family comes in pin-compatible 3.0 x 3.0mm, 16-pin QFN packages. The common footprint enables a single design to address multiple bands via simple component swaps.
Samples and evaluation boards are available now for the GRF5506.
Guerrilla RF provides high performance monolithic microwave integrated circuits (MMICs) to wireless OEMs in multiple market segments, including 5G/4G macro and small cell base stations, cellular repeaters/DAS, automotive SDARS/V2X/DAB, mission critical military communications, navigation and high fidelity wireless audio.
