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Today in Science History -
 "Portable" is
a matter of perspective when it comes to large systems. Anything that can
be put on wheels and moved over land is technically portable, but the
speed at which it can be brought into operation once relocated is what
really defines whether something is portable or not. To be truly portable,
all of the requisite support equipment must travel with it; e.g., electric
generators, fuel, water, food, personnel facilities (if needed), etc. The
MPN−14
portable airport surveillance radar (ASR) and precision approach radar
(PAR) unit I worked on in the USAF truly qualified since it was entirely
self-contained and the necessary power generators were supplied by a
separate shop within the 5th Combat Communications Group to which I
belonged. Other shops provided creature comfort facilities, ground-based
and satellite radio communications, tactical air navigation (TACAN),
security, and managerial services. A few times each year we had what were
called "Healthy Strikes" where claxons would sound in the barracks...
 On Wednesday,
January 20th at 2:00 PM EST (GMT -5:00), Copper Mountain Technologies will
present another of its VNA Master Class Webinar series entitled "Materials
Measurement at 5G Frequencies." This webinar will demonstrate the use
of free-space spot probes to characterize materials at 20 to 40 GHz, of
interest to new 5G millimeter wave frequencies. A table-top measurement
system using CMT's S5243 VNA will be used to determine transmission and/or
reflection of materials. From these measurements, the webinar will discuss
the calculation of dielectric properties of measured materials. The agenda
consists of free space measurement description, example measurements &
dielectric calculation and a Q&A session at the end...
 Ha, I thought WA referred to Washington
state, but not so. It's a good thing because I was going to accuse them of
using a phony photo that includes the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds which
are not visible from Washington! "A remote outback station about 800 km
north of Perth in Western Australia is one of the best places in the world
to operate telescopes that listen for radio signals from space. It's the site
of CSIRO's Murchison
Radio-astronomy Observatory (MRO) and is home to three telescopes (and
soon a fourth when half of the Square Kilometre Array, the world's largest
radio telescope, is built there). But it's important these telescopes don't
pick up any other radio signals generated here on Earth that could interfere
with their observations. That's why the observatory was set up with strict
rules on what can and can't be used on site..."
 Before the current generation began
destroying its hearing with smartphone earbuds, their parents and grandparents
(that includes mine) destroyed our hearing with ridiculously
powerful loudspeakers, often in boom boxes perched on shoulders right
next to the ears (not me). The "concert hall" - or concert auditorium - experience
has been long sought-after since recorded music has been available, which
has only been about a century. As evidenced by the sudden increase in articles
and advertisements in my growing collection of vintage electronics magazines,
the early and mid 1950s saw a sudden swell of articles promoting the equally
swelling supply of high fidelity (hi-fi) recording and playback equipment
hitting the markets. Subjects ranging from homebuilt projects to reports of
top end commercially products filled the pages each month. Television saw
the same treatment in the late 1950s and early 1960s...
 Qorvo, a leading provider of innovative
solutions that connect and power the world, today introduced two
Wi-Fi 6E front end modules (FEMs) designed to maximize throughput and
range in high-bandwidth applications such as 8K video streaming, online gaming
and virtual reality. Wi-Fi 6E is an extension of Wi-Fi 6 that operates in
the recently opened 6 GHz frequency band, in addition to the traditional
2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands. Wi-Fi 6E triples Wi-Fi capacity with contiguous
spectrum to accommodate 7 additional 160 MHz-wide channels or 14 additional
80 MHz channels. Qorvo's Wi-Fi 6E FEMs unleash the full potential of
this new spectrum, delivering leading linearity performance and maximizing
throughput and capacity at peak permissible indoor power levels...
 ConductRF is continually innovating
and developing new and improved solutions for RF Interconnect needs. See the
latest TESTeCON RF Test
Cables for labs. ConductRF makes production and test coax cable assemblies
for amplitude and phased matched VNA applications as well as standard &
precision RF connectors. Over 1,000 solutions for low PIM in-building to choose
from in the iBwave component library. They also provide custom coax solutions
for applications where some standard just won't do. A partnership with Newark
assures fast, reliable access. Please visit
ConductRF today to
see how they can help your project!
 Have you been looking for a Zenith
Radio Nurse, a Superior Speedometer Multitester, or maybe a Clough Brengle
3" Oscilloscope? Perhaps you happen to have a wireless phono oscillator, a
Weston 722 radio, or a Dumont 3" model 164E oscilloscope for sale. In either
case, the
Sprague Trading Post would have been the place to go in the mid 1940s,
when the company paid good money in Radio-Craft magazine to host a swap shop
for electronics hobbyists and professionals. Vacuum tubes, radios, test equipment,
and related items were offered and requested. Sprague was/is a major manufacturer
of capacitors, so they probably figured some of the equipment would need replacement
capacitors which traders would buy from them...
 Rohde & Schwarz has a downloadable
whitepaper entitled, "Over-the-Air
(OTA) Testing - Important Antenna Parameters, Test System Setup and Calibration."
Future technologies and standards will make over-the-air (OTA) testing mandatory.
At the same time, integrated antennas are becoming more common with each development
cycle such as for low-cost IoT devices and 5G mmWave devices. Since measurement
requirements will change with OTA testing, engineers need a basic understanding
of antennas and antenna measurements. This paper provides you with extensive
knowledge on the following: Antennas in general, their parameters and different
types, as well as antenna characterization and testing The importance and
execution of OTA test setup calibration...
 "Join our webinar on January 20th,
to learn how
Kinetic Vision uses Altium's platform to enable a connected and frictionless
PCB design experience, increasing their productivity x5 even in the midst
of Covid. For over 30 years, Kinetic Vision has provided technology solutions
to over 50 of the top Fortune 500 companies in the world. Hear about how their
embedded development team needed a better design and collaboration solution
to satisfy the increasing needs of their demanding clients and how Altium
helped solve their toughest issues. Altium Designer is their tool of choice
when it comes to designing PCBs, as it provides the most connected PCB design
experience - removing the common points of friction that occur throughout
a typical design flow. With the Covid situation, using Altium's platform became
even more essential as it enabled seamless remote working..."
 The announcement of the
merging of Radio-Craft and Radio & Television magazines into
a single publication was made on the eve of America's entrance into World
War II. Knowing the visionary talents of publisher Hugo Gernsback, he
probably did so at least partly due to what could be predicted as a severe
contraction of the domestic electronics appliance market once the war machine
gears began cranking. It turns out that he was in fact prescient, because
history shows that the government did direct all critical production to military
equipment. Buying a new model radio, television, washing machine, and to some
extent car grew increasingly difficult from about 1942 through 1945...
 Guerrilla RF introduces the GRF5508
and GRF5510, two of ten new
¼ W linear power amplifiers being released as part of the company's expansion
into the cellular market. These new InGaP HBT amplifiers were designed specifically
for 5G/4G wireless infrastructure applications requiring exceptional native
linearity over temperature extremes of -40°C to 85°C. Spanning frequency ranges
of 800-900 MHz and 880-960 MHz respectively, the GRF5508 and GRF5510
are tuned to operate within the n5, n8, n18, n20 and n26 5G new radio (NR)
bands. The devices can deliver 24 dBm of linear power over the entire
-40°C to 85°C temperature...
 Copper Mountain Technologies develops
innovative and robust RF test and measurement solutions for engineers all
over the world. Copper Mountain's extensive line of unique form factor
Vector Network
Analyzers include an RF measurement module and a software application
which runs on any Windows PC, laptop or tablet, connecting to the measurement
hardware via USB interface. The result is a lower cost, faster, more effective
test process that fits into the modern workspace in lab, production, field
and secure testing environments.
 The Duoscope, as presented in a 1954
issue of Radio-News magazine, was a pretty neat concept - sort of
like a picture-in-picture (PiP) scheme for television, only in a way much
better. Whereas PiP provides only a partial screen for each television program,
Du Mont's "Duoscopic" viewer somehow received two independent signals
and combined them on the screen in such a manner that there was both a horizontally
polarized for one show and a vertically polarized image for the other. The
viewer selected which picture to watch by wearing the appropriately polarized
glasses or by watching through a floor-mounted transparent, polarized screen.
The superimposed image on the CRT looked a lot like a virtually indiscernible
3-D picture as seen without colored glasses. Similarly, the audio for each
program was selectable using a remote (wired) switch box. Headphones were
used to provide private listening. The Duoscope turned out to be just another
"outside the box" concept that never played out in the consumer world...
 Withwave's new
End Launch 1.0 mm (Narrow Block) coaxial connectors are specially
designed for well used high frequency substrates to minimize electromagnetic
effects including impedance discontinuities from coaxial to GCPWG (Grounded
Coplanar Waveguide) and Top Ground Microstrip structure. The types of connectors
are 2.92 mm, 2.4 mm, 1.85 mm & 1.0 mm. Applications
include RFIC Chip set evaluation boards, high data rate ASIC and SoC evaluation
module test, and substrate characterization. We solve your performance
and cost problems.
 "While most of the world is still using
the 4G networks and some companies have just released 5G networks,
China is testing next-generation wireless technology that is said to be
100 times faster than the American version of 5G. This next-generation network
expands from the 5G millimeter-wave frequency to terahertz frequency. The
5G network promises mass connectivity, ultra-reliability, and guaranteed low
latency. However, there is a limit to what 5G can do until 2030 and beyond.
New Chinese research has outlined four major paradigm shifts that are needed
for a next-generation network. The long-form review is entitled "Towards 6G
wireless communication networks: vision, enabling technologies, and new paradigm
shifts..."
 Rohde & Schwarz recently published
a white paper entitled, "Radio
Fundamentals for Cellular Networks." It begins: "Cellular technologies
have advanced from first generation (1G) analog technologies to advanced high
performance fourth generation (4G) and fifth generation (5G) systems in just
four decades. Despite the increase in complexity of wireless standards and
devices, cellular technologies maintain a set of common principles that form
the basis behind the design of cellular systems. In this white paper, we explore
these basic principles and examine the underlying technologies that lay the
foundation for today and future cellular systems." BTW, does anyone else think
R&S's use of that light blue on a gray background is not a very good choice?
 There are a lot of audiophiles in the
RF Cafe audience, so this 10-question
Audio Quiz from Popular Electronics should prove useful. It covers
not just the physical aspects but also some simple electronics concepts, like
decibels of gain, crossover networks, push-pull amplifiers, etc. High fidelity
(hi-fi) stereophonic equipment was all the rage in the 1950s and 1960s. It
was a way for people to enjoy live concert quality music in their homes since
the quality of radio transmissions was not reliable, and stereo broadcasting
was not a common feature until the 1960s. Many articles were published educating
beginners and veterans on ways to optimize both equipment - receivers, turntables,
speakers, equalizers, etc. - and environmental parameters. Similarly, many
stereo-themed comics...
 Atenlab has been operating in Taiwan
for more than a decade, and has sold and installed hundreds chambers around
the world. Holistic, affordable Over-the-Air
(OTA) measurement systems perform comprehensive measurement and test in
a controlled environment. Compact Antenna Test Range (CATR) with one-touch
operation supports multiple systems - 2G, 3G, 4G, 5G - and major instrument
brands. [M]ulti-probe OTA measurement systems offer reduced time measurements
over single-probe systems.
 Meissner was one of many electronics
manufacturers that re-tooled their facilities for defense production during
the war years. They made RF coils and transformers (and a few radios). Company
public relations offices were sure to make their contributions known to people
who used their products and/or services. In this 1944 full-page ad in Radio-Craft
magazine, Meissner touted its coveted Army-Navy "E" rating, awarded for "excellence"
performance. According to the Wikipedia entry, only 2% of companies earned
the distinction, so it really was a big deal. The term "precision-el" was
used throughout Meissner promotions, and it took a bit of work to determine
what it meant. Turns out precision-el (i.e., precisionel) is a play on personnel
(i.e., personn-el). Such things were considered clever back in the day...
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