Concepts and Basic Terminology
R&S
®
SMW200A
1220User Manual 1175.6632.02 ─ 16
C Concepts and Basic Terminology
This section introduces the signal generation concept and explains the basic terminol-
ogy used throughout this documentation.
Signal Flow
The R&S SMW is equipped with a large touchscreen that displays the block diagram,
indicates the current state of the functional blocks, and allows you to monitor and
revise the signal flow. The signal processing flow follows the logical left-to-right direc-
tion, where the active functional blocks influence the generated signal.
Signal Path
The Figure C-1 illustrates the term signal path.
In the default instrument state (Standard mode), the block diagram of a fully equipped
R&S SMW displays two signal paths. A signal path describes the chain of functional
blocks from the baseband block to the RF output, for example the blocks"Baseband A",
"Fading A", "AWGN A", "I/Q Mod A" and "RF A". Throughout this documentation, the
upper processing chain is denoted as first signal path or as path A.
Figure C-1: Explanation of the terms "signal path"
1 (blue) = first signal path; analog output signal
2 (red) = second signal path; digital output signal
Compare the signal processing in both paths on Figure C-1. In the first path, the output
signal is an analog signal modulated on a radio frequency (RF). The second signal
path is digital one. The digital baseband signal is routed to the digital output interface;
the output signal is not modulated on an RF.
In Advanced mode, however, the block diagram represents the signal flow more
abstract; not all functional blocks are dedicated to a signal path (see also Figure C-3).
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