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Registered Member #1316
Joined: Thu Feb 14 2008, 03:35AM
Location: Cambridge, MA
Posts: 365
I recently ordered a SDR (bladeRF) and was looking for an external amplifier. While browsing the mini-circuits website I noticed that there is an extreme price difference between the plug-in amplifier components and the monolithic amplifier ICs.
Obviously the plug-in amplifier would be more expensive, but it seems that the price difference is excessive. From only a few dollars for a monolithic amplifier to hundreds of dollars for a comparable plugin amplifier. In many cases the monolithic amplifier even has better specifications.
Take for example these two amplfiers with very similar specifications and a 100x price difference between the monolithic amplifier and the plugin one. The monolithic amplifier even has better specifications. At this price difference I could just make a one-off PCB for the monolithic amplifier.
Am I overlooking something in my comparison, or is price just an insignificant factor in the market for plugin amplifiers?
Registered Member #56
Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 05:02AM
Location: Southern Califorina, USA
Posts: 2445
It depends a lot on the application, the two amplifiers you are comparing are completely different generations and are built using very different technology (the fact that the ZHL is like 100 times larger might have tipped you off). I am sure it is cheaper for them to make the HEMT based one, where as pushing 20th century style RF transistors to 4GHz takes a bit of work. Wouldn't even surprise me if there is some manual tuning that goes into the construction of the ZHL series.
That said, the more modern CMA does deliver most of the performance that the ZHL does, but keep in mind that the gain of the CMA drops down to under 20db at 1GHz and under 10gb at 4GHz higher frequencies, and is not specified below 50MHZ, so you you will need to consider if that is acceptable for your application. Also, keep in mind that fabricating a PCB that works well up to 4GHz is outside the capabilities of most 'cheap' board houses (you really should be using some sort of impedance controlled substrate, preferably one which is not too lossy at the frequencies you are using, although for the size of the carrier the loss will not be that big of a problem).
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Price Difference Between Plugin Amplifiers and Monolithic Amplifiers
