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Anyone have feedback the Minicircuits eVNA-63+ 6 GHz VNA?
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JohnG:
I have been on the lookout for a moderate cost VNA for my company. I recently came across one from Minicircuits, and was wondering if anyone has had any experience with it?

https://www.minicircuits.com/WebStore/Vector-Network_Analyzer.html

It is in line with small VNAs like those produced by Tek, Pico, etc. I don't need top of the line, but the NanoVNA is just not cutting it (amazing price/performance, but I need more performance). Mainly I need more dynamic range and a bit better frequency response, but also it gets old dealing with flaky and non-standard communication protocols.

Any comments or info are appreciated.

Thanks,
John
profanum429:
I haven't used the Minicircuits one but that software looks like a carbon copy of the VectorVu software from Tektronix for their (now discontinued) TTR VNA series. I wonder if they obtained it from Tek now that they are out of the VNA business...
KE5FX:
Interesting, I didn't know Tek had discontinued their VNA.    It's (still) a rather crowded market.  From a message I posted a few months ago to an email list where the same question came up:

(snip)
There's a massive selection of VNA options in the $10K-and-under price class.  A few years ago, tempted by Copper Mountain's evident success, I built a 6 GHz 4-receiver USB VNA with the intent of jumping into the commercial market.  By the time I finished the prototype hardware, the bang:buck ratio was no longer competitive with some of the other offerings, so I ultimately killed the project.  In the course of making that decision, I did an informal market survey, which now includes more than a dozen competitive manufacturers:

- Arinst
- Deepace
- Anritsu's Shockline and SpectrumMaster series
- Keysight P937xA Streamline series
- Obviously the Keysight FieldFox qualifies
- Megiq
- Even MiniCircuits now offers a 6 GHz USB VNA (eVNA-63+)
- Copper Mountain
- Pico Technologies, as discussed here
- Tektronix TTR506A
- LA Techniques
- Transcom / Setup Electronica T6
- Siglent (not handheld, but much lighter and cheaper than some of the older competitors)

And that doesn't even count the low-end offerings in the NanoVNA, LibreVNA, PocketVNA and similar families, or Henrik Forsten's nicely-executed homebrew job at https://hforsten.com/improved-homemade-vna.html.  Ultimately, none of them including my own was a suitable replacement for my old 8753C/85047A outfit.  Most were either too expensive, lacked important features, specifications, and/or quality, or had some combination of the above drawbacks. 

If I were looking for a portable unit in the 4K range, I'd probably look for a used FieldFox.  But if you don't actually need any of the FieldFox's specs or unique features, it would be crazy not to start by spending a few hundred bucks on one of the newer Asian offerings and see if you outgrow it.  Failing that, the Megiq is probably a decent choice, going by Shahriar's review on his Signal Path channel, and the new ones from Tek, Keysight, and Mini-Circuits look intriguing as well.  None of them will be as cost-effective as a used HP, though, and certainly not as cost-effective as the newest generation of Nano-class models.  Not even close.
(end snip)

So, since you're in the position of having outgrown the low-cost Asian imports, my vote would be for an 8753C/D/ES or used FieldFox.  You can probably buy two or three of those for what the Mini-Circuits model costs.
JohnG:
Thanks, your list is pretty comprehensive. The Fieldfox series never got on my radar, so to speak, not sure why. I will give it a look. I was hoping to avoid another boat anchor, because I'm getting tight on space.

John
TheSteve:
If you get a FieldFox the cheapest unit with a proper 2 port VNA is the N9923A. After that for better performance(and a lot of other features) you'd need the N9914A and up.
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