RF fundamentals training course description

Radio Frequency engineering is an important yet often overlooked area in today's wireless world. This course provides a grounding in RF theory and practice for wireless, cellular and microwave systems.

What will you learn

• Explain the basics of RF.
• Describe RF propagation and antenna principles.
• Calculate propagation losses and link budgets.
• Test RF systems.

RF fundamentals training course details

RF fundamentals training course contents

• What is RF?

Definition of RF, RF wave characteristics: Frequency, wavelength, power, phase, impedance, RF history, radio signals, frequency bands, safety issues, legal issues.

• RF systems

Microwaves, cellular/mobile RF, WLANs, other fixed wireless networks, basic RF components.
Hands on Building a basic WLAN network.

• RF system components

Transmitters: Antennas: Isotropic, Dipole, how antennas achieve gain.

• Modulation

Schemes, bandwidth, AM, FM, FSK, PSK, QAM, QPSK, interference, performance.
Hands on Interference and performance.

• Multiple access schemes

FDMA, CDMA, TDMA, CSMA/CA.

• Wireless systems

Cellular (GSM, UMTS), Wifi, WiMax, others: GPS, DBS, RFID, radar, Bluetooth.
Hands on cellular.

• Spread Spectrum technologies

Spread spectrum benefits and disadvantages, how it works, Direct Sequence, Frequency Hopping, hybrids.

• RF propagation

Models, link budget, Smith chart, RF matching with the Smith chart. cell capacity, tradeoffs: power vs. bandwidth, free space, reflection, diffraction, multipath cancellation, propagation prediction and measurement tools.
Hands on Smith charts.

• RF testing

Why power rather than voltage/current, units of power, dB and dBm power conversions. Test equipment: signal generators, power meters, network analysers, spectrum analysers. RF test setups: return loss, insertion loss.
Hands on RF testing.

Learning path

Reviews