Long battery life is a key criterion for mobile devices as well as for embedded systems and chips for Internet-of-Things and machine-to-machine applications. Rohde & Schwarz now provides a complete solution for testing battery life in all operating modes. It consists of an R&S CMW radio communication tester, the new R&S RT-ZVC power probe and the R&S CMWrun sequencer software.
The radio communication tester manages the communications with the DUT and also places the DUT in the various operating modes. The power probe acquires current and voltage readings at defined test points on the DUT. The sequencer software controls the entire process and delivers detailed measurement reports to the user. The user can precisely correlate the events occurring at the mobile interface with the DUT’s power consumption. Thanks to the R&S RT-ZVC probe’s high dynamic range, this is possible over the entire measurement range – from low currents in standby or sleep mode to large currents when the DUT transmits at maximum power.
The multichannel design of the probe makes it possible to simultaneously acquire and correlate the power at up to four different test points. Users can therefore compare the power consumption of individual subcomponents, such as an application processor, the RF transmit unit and other components, against the total power consumption within a realistic signaling scenario controlled by the R&S CMW500.
Solution supports all prevalent mobile communications standards The power probe was designed specifically for the R&S CMW family of radio communication testers. When used in combination with the R&S CMWrun automation software, long-term monitoring of automated signaling test scenarios is possible, as needed for performance tests, regression tests and acceptance tests. Even the test scenarios for the new 3GPP features for reducing power consumption in machine-tomachine applications, such as power save mode (PSM) and enhanced discontinuous reception (DRX), can now easily be measured and correlated. The solution supports all prevalent mobile communications technologies with connections in test, voice and data transfer mode.
