IDT ( www.idt.com ), an analog-digital company leading the core semiconductor solutions market, today launched a new multiplexing mixer for 4G wireless base stations featuring the industry's lowest power consumption and low distortion characteristics. Belonging to IDT's Zero-Distortion™ product family, this new product is characterized by reduced power consumption and distortion in LTE and Time-division Duplexing (TDD) wireless communication architectures. IDT's new LTE mixer is an RF product that plays a significant role in IDT's strategy to provide a complete wireless card signal chain, from the antenna to the digital signal processor (DSP).

The IDTF1162 is a low-power, low-distortion dual 2300-2700 MHz RF-IF mixer featuring superlinearity (+43 dBm) and third-order crossover (IP3O) to provide optimal intermodulation limiting characteristics, making it ideal for multi-carrier multi-mode cellular systems used in 4G wireless base station transceivers. Compared to competitor solutions, the IDTF1162 achieves industry-leading performance by improving IM3 distortion by 18 dB and reducing power consumption by 40% (1150 mW(typ)). Based on these characteristics, the new product not only alleviates heatsink requirements for wireless cards but also enables infrastructure equipment manufacturers to utilize higher signal-to-noise ratios (SNR) through higher average front-end gain settings. Receive SNR improved by up to 0.4 dB provides mobile operators with the benefit of expanding reach and improving available data rates for users around cells.

Tom Sparkman, General Manager and Vice President of IDT’s Communications Business Unit, introduced the latest mixer products as “part of IDT’s business strategy targeting the $600 million RF card market for wireless infrastructure.” He stated, “Following the previously announced IDTF1150 and IDTF1152, the IDTF1162 provides higher high-frequency input characteristics in addition to all the industry-leading features customers expect from IDT,” and explained, “These products complement other solutions in IDT’s wireless signal chain solution portfolio, including Serial RapidIO®, high-performance timing, and data compression.”

The IDTF1162 provides rapid stabilization from power-up and a constant Local Oscillator (LO) input impedance. This allows customers to power down the mixer between TDD receiver slots and reduce power consumption. Furthermore, IDT's new mixer is designed to operate at a constant package external temperature (TC) of 100°C. This is a critical characteristic required for ICs in remote radio equipment where components are densely packed. Like other IDT RF mixer products, the IDTF1162 is pin-compatible with other existing products on the market, facilitating rapid component upgrades.

Price and supply
Samples of the IDTF1162 in a 6 x 6mm package are currently being supplied to select customers. More information about IDT's RF portfolio can be found at www.idt.com/go/RF .