Re: [Discuss-gnuradio] Gauging interest for an SDR PA

[Brian Padalino]

On Tue, Nov 26, 2013 at 9:37 PM, Louis Brown <address@hidden> wrote:
> Given the availability of SDR hardware (USRPs, BladeRF, HackRF, etc) covering 
> VHF through S/C bands, is there any interest in a wide band power amp to 
> complement this hardware?  GaN seems to be ubiquitous now, and there are 
> medium power, 48 VDC parts available in low cost SMT packages.  So I think 
> it's feasible for something like:
>
> 50 MHz - 3 GHz bandwidth
> Class AB
> 5 - 30 VDC supply (high efficiency, high frequency boost supply)
> 10 dBm drive
> 37 dBm Psat
> Robust to full mismatch (open/short)
> Logic level enable
> ALC with VSWR monitoring (serial, I2C, etc)
> Small (cigarette pack or smaller)
> Low cost
> Open source

This sounds neat to me.  Would you plan on having harmonic filter
banks on the input and/or output of the amplifier? How do you think
you would tackle the ALC with the different arbitrary bandwidths of
the SDR signals?  Also, curiously, do you have an efficiency in mind
that you want to design for?

Brian