Anyone have a favorite low power (as in tens of milliwatts) receiver IC that
you can still get ahold of? I'm looking to see what could potentially replace
some Philips UAA2080's, which are no longer available new from Philips. They
were a really great part, giving you an oscillator, frequency mulitplier, RF
pre-amp, I/Q mixers and a bit of demodulation (they were intended for use in
pagers but gave you the raw I/Q output so could be pushed into service for
other applications too) -- all of this for less than 10mW!

Looking around at parts, it seems that even plain old mixers now often run
50mW or more. Ostensibly this seems due to their usage at higher frequencies
(low GHz range), which I can understand, but it's a feature don't require.
I'm after low power parts for dealing with more pedestrian frequencies (low to
mid-hundreds of MHz) and small bandwidths (single digit kHz).

Thanks,
---Joel KOlstad

Joel Kolstad wrote:

Anyone have a favorite low power (as in tens of milliwatts) receiver IC that
you can still get ahold of? I'm looking to see what could potentially replace
some Philips UAA2080's, which are no longer available new from Philips. They
were a really great part, giving you an oscillator, frequency mulitplier, RF
pre-amp, I/Q mixers and a bit of demodulation (they were intended for use in
pagers but gave you the raw I/Q output so could be pushed into service for
other applications too) -- all of this for less than 10mW!

Looking around at parts, it seems that even plain old mixers now often run
50mW or more. Ostensibly this seems due to their usage at higher frequencies
(low GHz range), which I can understand, but it's a feature don't require.
I'm after low power parts for dealing with more pedestrian frequencies (low to
mid-hundreds of MHz) and small bandwidths (single digit kHz).

Thanks,
---Joel KOlstad


Hey, if you find one let me know!

Have you considered looking at one of the obsolete-components suppliers?
It sounds stupid, but it seems like a lot of good RF parts for VHF are
going by the wayside as everyone gets on the GHz bandwagon.

Maybe we could hire Jim Thompson and start a company...

--

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com

Posting from Google? See http://cfaj.freeshell.org/google/

Joel Kolstad wrote:

Anyone have a favorite low power (as in tens of milliwatts) receiver IC
that
you can still get ahold of? I'm looking to see what could potentially
replace
some Philips UAA2080's, which are no longer available new from Philips.
They were a really great part, giving you an oscillator, frequency
mulitplier, RF pre-amp, I/Q mixers and a bit of demodulation (they were
intended for use in pagers but gave you the raw I/Q output so could be
pushed into service for other applications too) -- all of this for less
than 10mW!

Looking around at parts, it seems that even plain old mixers now often run
50mW or more. Ostensibly this seems due to their usage at higher
frequencies (low GHz range), which I can understand, but it's a feature
don't require. I'm after low power parts for dealing with more pedestrian
frequencies (low to mid-hundreds of MHz) and small bandwidths (single
digit kHz).

Thanks,
---Joel KOlstad

Most manufacturers seem to be obsessed with "high intercept point", which is
desirable in some instances, but always carries a major power penalty.
With the demise of some of my favourite ICs, I'm going back to discrete
components for many things.

Bob
--
Everything gets easier with practice, except getting up in the morning!

Hi Tim,

"Tim Wescott" wrote in message
...
Hey, if you find one let me know!

Yeah, will do!

Have you considered looking at one of the obsolete-components suppliers?

Not yet, I'll check there shortly.

Maybe we could hire Jim Thompson and start a company...

I could use about 1000 of them right about now... perhaps even a couple
thousand. But I suspect the quantity would have to be in at least the tens of
thousands if not hundreds of thousands before anyone would be willing to build
something new...

Joel Kolstad wrote:

Hi Tim,

"Tim Wescott" wrote in message
...
Hey, if you find one let me know!

Yeah, will do!

Have you considered looking at one of the obsolete-components suppliers?

Not yet, I'll check there shortly.

Maybe we could hire Jim Thompson and start a company...

I could use about 1000 of them right about now... perhaps even a couple
thousand. But I suspect the quantity would have to be in at least the tens of
thousands if not hundreds of thousands before anyone would be willing to build
something new...


Check with Lansdale to see if they can help. They buy the rights to
manufacture a lot of EOL parts. http://www.lansdale.com/


--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida