2nd order sigma delta modulator

In a previous post, the variance of the in-band quantization noise for a first order sigma delta modulator was derived. Taking it one step furhter, let us find the variance of the quantization noise filtered by a second order filter. With a first order filter, the quantization noise passes through a system with transfer function…

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Understanding an OFDM transmission

Let us try to understand simulation of a typical Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) transmission defined per IEEE 802.11a specification. Orthogonal pulses In a previous post (here ), we have understood that the minimum frequency separation for two sinusoidals with arbitrary phases to be orthogonal is , where is the symbol period. In Orthogonal Frequency…

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GATE-2012 ECE Q28 (electromagnetics)

Question 28 on electromagnetics from GATE (Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering) 2012 Electronics and Communication Engineering paper. Q28. A transmission line with a characteristic impedance of 100 is used to match a 50 section to a 200 section. If the matching is to be done both at 429MHz and 1GHz, the length of the transmission line can be approximately (A) 82.5cm…

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GATE-2012 ECE Q11 (signals)

Question 11 on signals from GATE (Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering) 2012 Electronics and Communication Engineering paper. Q11. The unilateral Laplace transform of is . The unilateral Laplace transform ofis (A)  (B)  (C)  (D)  Solution From the definition of Laplace transform for a function defined for all real numbers  is,  , where  with real numbers  and . To find the Laplace…

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Oscillator phase noise

Oscillators are used in typical radio circuits to drive the mixer used for the up-conversion or down-conversion of the passband transmission. Ideally, the spectrum of the oscillator is expected to have an impulse at the frequency of oscillation with no frequency components else where. However the spectrum of practical oscillators do have spectrum skirts around…

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Deriving PDF of Rayleigh random variable

In the post on Rayleigh channel model, we stated that a circularly symmetric random variable is of the form , where real and imaginary parts are zero mean independent and identically distributed (iid) Gaussian random variables. The magnitude which has the probability density, is called a Rayleigh random variable. Further, the phase is uniformly distributed from…

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