NI's Software Defined Radios (SDRs) represent powerful, flexible platforms for developing advanced radio and signal processing systems. They combine high bandwidth, precise synchronization, and a high-performance FPGA architecture in an open development environment. This makes systems like the Ettus USRP X420 particularly suitable for demanding research and development tasks requiring high frequency ranges, high data rates, and real-time processing. The integration of a programmable FPGA and support for the open UHD driver enable flexible implementation of custom signal processing algorithms and seamless integration into various software environments.
Typical applications for NI Ettus Software Defined Radios include advanced wireless research, radar prototyping, and satellite communications applications. With their support for high frequencies and wide bandwidths, these systems are also suitable for experiments related to future mobile communication generations, such as non-terrestrial networks (NTN) in the 6G environment. Furthermore, the high instant bandwidth enables applications such as high-resolution localization or combined communication and sensing systems. Thanks to precise synchronization capabilities, multi-channel, phase-coherent measurement and communication systems can also be implemented. The Ettus USRP X420 is a particularly powerful software-defined radio for applications with very high frequencies and bandwidths. It offers two transmit and two receive channels with a frequency range of 10 MHz to 20 GHz and an instant bandwidth of up to 1 GHz per channel. These features enable demanding applications such as high-resolution localization or broadband radio experiments. The system is based on the AMD Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC ZU28DR and features an integrated, programmable FPGA for real-time signal processing. Features such as integrated LO sharing for phase-coherent multi-channel systems with less than 1° RMS phase deviation, extensive synchronization options via GPSDO, and reference inputs for 10 MHz and PPS make the Ettus USRP X420 a powerful platform for modern radio and radar developments. Product Features: Frequency range: 10 MHz to 20 GHz Instant bandwidth: up to 1 GHz per channel 2 transmit and 2 receive channels (TX/RX ports and RX2 port) Integrated LO sharing for phase-coherent multi-channel systems (<1° RMS) FPGA: AMD Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC ZU28DR Synchronization via Integrated GPSDO and 10 MHz and PPS reference inputs
Trigger In/Out interface
LO In and LO Out
2 HDMI GPIO interfaces
USB-C port for serial console and JTAG
Network interfaces: Dual 100GbE or Quad 10GbE via QSFP28 and 1GbE via RJ45
Software compatibility via the open UHD driver
Supported development tools: UHD, GNU Radio, Python, C/C++ and LabVIEW
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