Hi,
I have a question about my receiver measurement. I have the receiver front-end (up to the based-band amplifiers) with differential output and I want to characterize it for gain, noise figure, IIP2, IIP3, P1dB. My question is what I should do to connect my circuit with the measuring equipment. Since the circuits have differential output from the based-band amplifier and the instruments have single-end input. I'm considering about:
1. Can I use a balun to convert to single-end output and using a high-impedance probe to measure it. (My based-band signal is 0-2MHz and I found a low frequency balun from MiniCircuits).
2. I saw some note suggesting about an instrument amplifier as a output buffer. Is there any pros and cons for this method? Is is a suitable way for other measurement such as noise figure, IIP2, IIP3?
3. Can I just directly measure at only one-end of the differential output by using an active probe connected with the spectrum analyzer? With this way, I am not sure how to calculate my results correctly. Are there any literature or guideline for this method?
Please give me some advice about this measurement. I am new to these measurements and want to learn an appropriate way that many people do. Thank you so much in advance for any comments.