TRUST approach to software defined radio: RF considerations

Abstract

The design of the RF component of a Software Defined Radio (SDR) is a challenging task. This paper sets out to examine the important issues concerning the design of both the transmitter and the receiver. Techniques of achieving wideband linearity in the transmitter are reviewed. The importance of being able to design a low phase noise oscillator to operate over a wide range of frequencies is discussed. Receiver architecture is also reviewed. The major problems associated with the design of the receiver component of an SDR(linearity and image signals) are reviewed. The relationship of blocker specifications to receiver linearity is described. The paper concludes with a discussion of some problems unique to SDRs, and in particular those that need to be transparently reconfigure