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While engineers have long used LabVIEW as a programming language to automate instrumentation, new
communications toolkits in LabVIEW enable engineers to test many RF devices using virtual instrumentation.
Unlike traditional RF signal generators and analyzers that contain fixed personalities for standards such as GPS,
Wireless LAN (WLAN), Fixed WiMAX, and others, virtual instrumentation provides equivalent measurement
functionality while maintaining an “open-source” software architecture. The open source toolkit approach to
software-defined RF test produces many benefits including:
Measurements for a variety of wireless standards including WLAN, WiMAX, GPS, and others
Integrated DC, digital, and baseband measurements onto same system
Significantly faster measurement times with delivered by multicore central processing units (CPUs)
LabVIEW toolkits for WiMAX, Wireless LAN (WLAN), and GPS utilize virtual instrument handles to create baseband
waveforms, apply IQ impairments, perform measurement, and set RF characteristics. While RF toolkits and the
corresponding example programs are explicitly designed to operate with PXI RF instrumentation, they can also be
used with other instrumentation and to simulate physical layer RF characteristics. This tutorial examines the
architecture of RF LabVIEW toolkits and the ways you can use them to simulate physical layer impairments in
software.
Using script mode, you can enter either a series of GPS waypoints or a series of “straight” and “arc” commands.
For example, the following script in Table 1 configures a generation session that simulates a receiver moving on an
oval track.
begin
straight great_circle 60 15
arc 3 180 5
straight great_circle 60 15
arc 3 180 5
end
With features such as custom motion trajectories, engineers can use the GPS toolkit to create baseband
waveforms that simulate custom receiver movement. The toolkit provides LabVIEW example code to create GPS
waveforms that can be either written to a binary file or generated with a PXI RF vector signal generator.
As Figure 2 illustrates, you can use the NI WLAN Generation Toolkit to create highly customized signals. Here, a
property node is used to set characteristics such as DC offset, IQ gain imbalance, and quadrature skew. By setting
these characteristics, you can simulate the quadrature impairments present on a direct quadrature modulator. In
Figure 3, observe the constellation plot of a 16-QAM (24 Mbits/s 802.11g) signal with 1 dB of IQ gain imbalance
and 1 deg of quadrature skew.
Figure 3. Analysis of impaired WLAN Signal
In figure 3, the constellation plot has been produced by the WLAN Analysis Toolkit without the use of actual
measurement hardware. Here the measured error vector magnitude (EVM) is -21.5 dB.
For simulated WiMAX waveforms, the measured EVM of the modulated signal is nearly identical to the level of
simulated AWGN. For example, when we simulate an SNR of 31 dB, the EVM measured by the NI Analysis Toolkit
for Fixed WiMAX reports a result of -31.2 dB. Figure 5 shows a constellation plot of the simulated sub-frame.
Figure 5. Constellation of Fixed WiMAX Subframe
The smeared or blurred constellation points in Figure 5 indicate that the simulated waveform contains
impairments. Note that the NI Signal Generation Toolkit for Fixed WiMAX enables you to create customized
frames and sub-frames. Consistent with the IEEE 802.16-2004 standard, a simulated sub-frame can contain
multiple bursts. In this example, our the simulated waveform contains a 64-QAM burst (green), a 16-QAM burst
(black), a QPSK burst (red), and a BPSK burst (blue).
With functions for upconversion and downconversion to and from IF/RF, you can simulate channel impairments at
both baseband and RF/IF. The block diagram in figure 6 illustrates how to apply a multi-tone blocker signal to a
baseband waveform. The power spectrum of the simulated output is shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7. Power Spectrum of Simulated Fixed WiMAX Waveform at IF.
In addition to applying impairments with specialized communications toolkits such as the modulation toolkit, you
can also apply many other signal processing routines with core LabVIEW functions. In figure 8, observe the block
diagram of an example that applies FIR and IIR lowpass filters to a simulated baseband waveform – and then
performs an EVM measurement on the filtered baseband signal.
When you digitally filter a simulated WLAN waveform that contains AWGN, you can effectively remove broadband
noise that it outside of the bandwidth of interest. When we execute the code shown in Figure 8, we observe that
applying an elliptic IIR filter improves the measured EVM. Figure 9 shows a zoomed in constellation diagram of the
filtered and unfiltered baseband symbol location. In this case, the simulated WLAN waveform has an SNR of 37 dB.
Figure 9. Constellation of filtered and unfiltered baseband
th
In Figures 8 and 9, the specific IIR filter implemented was a 5 order lowpass elliptic filter with a 10 MHz
bandwidth, a passband ripple of 0.1 dB, and a stopband attenuation of 65 dB. Figure 9 illustrates the result of a
lowpass filter on an OFDM demodulator. By filtering broadband noise, the EVM result improved from -37.0 dB to -
43.6 dB.
In figure 10, we observe that while the NI Generation Toolkit for Fixed WiMAX produces baseband signals as a
complex waveform (for RF vector signal generators), this same waveform can be converted to analog baseband I/Q
(for a dual channel AWG) or to digital baseband I/Q (for a digital pattern generator).
Conversely, analysis toolkits such as those for WLAN and WIMAX can also be used with a wide variety of input
devices as well. Using either Modulation Toolkit or core LabVIEW functions, you can convert digital baseband,
analog baseband, and even intermediate frequency signals to the appropriate format for the RF analysis toolkits.
RF Toolkits in LabVIEW
Wireless standards toolkits in LabVIEW provide a fully flexible solution to both design and test of wireless devices.
Because all waveforms are created and analyzed in an open-source software environment, you can quickly and
easily introduce signal impairments, simulate wireless channel conditions, and even apply custom filters.
Combined with the general-purpose Modulation Toolkit, toolkits for GPS, WLAN, and Fixed WiMAX can be used
with both mixed signal and RF instrumentation. As a result, engineers designing GPS, WLAN, and WiMAX devices
have access to a new and fully-flexible design tool for these devices. For more information on simulating
communications signals in LabVIEW, please visit http://www.ni.com/wireless/testing_devices.htm.