[Test-Equipment] Spectrum Analyzer BW measurement

Thu, 29 Jan 2004 10:31:37 -0800

I saw a great write up on spectrum analyzer applications on:
http://tinyurl.com/3elcz

WBob

[email protected] wrote:

> I'm trying to measure some 10-30Khz bandwidths. As I understand, the
> correct method is to use the instrument's -3dB resolution BW (RBW) of
> approx 1% ?? of what you are trying to measure. This means a RBW of
> approx
> 0.1-0.3Khz. This instrument has and RBW of 5Hz, 50Hz, 500Hz, 5Khz, and
> 50Khz so I use 500Hz. If I use 5Khz the BW shown nearly doubles. I expect
> it to get wider but why twice ?. And if it's twice, it seems like I'd get
> widely variant BW measurements depending on if I'm able to select 500Hz,
> 1Khz or 3Khz or ? bandwidths. Or the BW would always have to be specified
> with a RBW ...which begs the question "What do you do if the spec is at
> 3Khz RBW and the closest you can get is 500Hz and 5Khz ? Do you assume
> the narrower RBW (500Hz) is more accurate anyway ?
> 
> Please send the resonse to me directly since I'm set to receive daily
> summary notes.
> 
> 73 Kees K5BCQ
> _______________________________________________
> Test-Equipment mailing list
> [email protected]
> http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/test-equipment
> 
> 
>