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Generate A Differential Signal Using A Transformer Plus Signal Splitter
Generate A Differential Signal Using A Transformer Plus Signal Splitter
If the amplifiers operate at +12 V, a single output swing may be limited by the supply rails (10 V p-p),
while an output swing taken differentially can be almost twice as much (18 V p-p diff.). Note that this
is the output were referring to and not the input. The input signal driven by the splitter is V p-p/gain.
Using a transformer to generate a differential signal is the least expensive approach (Fig. 2).
Measuring the transformers bandwidth is one important aspect, because we dont want the setup to
have less bandwidth than the amplifier. Figure 3
shows the frequency response of two transformers with different bandwidths. The curves show that
only transformer 2 is capable of measuring an amplifier with a 30-MHz bandwidth, while transformer
1 is limited to 4 MHz. An alternate solution in generating a differential signal is to use signal splitters.
The table