EEVblog Electronics Community Forum
Products => Test Equipment => Topic started by: washburn411 on April 04, 2017, 09:06:50 pm
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Would like to know if anyone is familiar with the HP E4432 b signal generator? Could this be used to align all types of radios? It is a very expensive but I am getting for a very good price. I am getting into all types of radio repairs and wanted to know more about this signal generator. Thank you so much for your time.
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Before buying check if the output works. AFAIK this is a weak point in these generators.
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The E4432B is an excellent choice for servicing radios of all types.
It has a frequency range to 3 GHz and supports both analog and digital modulation.
As with most test instruments, you should find out what options the unit is equipped with as this will help you to understand its capabilities.
You can search on the internet for the ESG series datasheet 5989-4074EN. This will provide an overview for you.
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OK - personally no experience. (Although it sure looks nice...) But...
What do you mean by: all types of radios? e.g.,
- broadcast bands - AM, FM
- HF/ VHF / UHF stuff
- digital radio - DVB, etc.
- mobile phone stuff - base stations, etc.
- 2.2 GHz stuff
- (... add many other items ...)
So importantly does "cheap" mean it serves your purposes? Always great to have good looking gear available, but based on experience my opinion any buy is always relative to: Does it really, actually do what you want it to do?
Of course it may depend on exactly how cheap you're talking... ;D
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I've got a couple of the 4GHz versions of this vector sig gen and they are very versatile. I'd agree with what has already been said about checking for options and checking the RF output level is correct.
The biggest limitation with these generators is that they are classed as economy grade by HP/Agilent/Keysight and the close in phase noise down on the shortwave frequencies is very poor. This is a side effect of the 'economy' signal generation method it uses for signals across 250kHz up through VHF.
So this generator would be fairly hopeless for any high performance testing for reciprocal mixing on a reasonable HF ham radio for example. Even a beginner could make a cheap 14.2MHz oscillator from a few components from the parts bin that would give a phase noise level at 10kHz offset that was >40dB better than this generator.
But if you just want to do basic testing on these bands it is very versatile. It is at its best up at UHF and is very versatile in terms of its analogue and digital capabilities... especially if can find one with the dual arb waveform generator option :)
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I've got a 4431 and have been pleased with it, lots of options for external signal inputs on the 443X series, so even though there's reasonable capability using internal parts, it's easy to feed into as part of a larger system. The high stability oscillator is pretty high end as far as ovenized quartz goes, if it includes that option. They are physically much larger than some more recent models (think old desktop tower PC), but the screen and controls and stuff is easy to use.
Verifiable output is definitely good, but it could also be useful to see system information screens too, my unit had some 55k hours of uptime on record, and though I haven't opened it to see if parts have been swapped at some point, there could definitely be some parts close to or beyond their normal expected lifetime in mine. Parts are available, as are broken units for parts, but they're not necessarily cheap.
There's also a video or two on youtube of repairs of units in this series. Lots of stuff to wade through, but some components are available and somewhat accessible, if need be, and things are marked well.
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For raw RF generators stable from 23 MHz to 6 GHz defined in its spec sheet the RFEGen does very well at $189, which I use. There is also the well regarded generators by Yarborough are similarly priced.
http://www.rf-consultant.com/calibrated-signal-generator/ (http://www.rf-consultant.com/calibrated-signal-generator/)
These are made purely as CW sources with fairly defined output stability and limited modulation capability.
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I have a well-provisioned E4438C on my bench, which I can also feed IQ signals to. The lower tier models in the family to me don't seem to justify their size and weight, and unless they're well-provisioned, their limited functionality. YMMV of course. For portable use and as a backup I've been considering the VSGs from Triarchy. Maybe someone in the forum has some actual experience with them?
http://triarchytech.com/ (http://triarchytech.com/)