Robert Adsett said:
And in what currency. They strike me as a tool for universities. "Grad
students are free".
[cough] We had one when I was in grad school... it was used for the microwave
labs where we built such uninspiring things as coupled stripline filters and
Wilkinson power dividers. I occasionally advocated trying out something a
little more intersting like a microwave oscillator or at least amplifier (or
maybe a dual-mode filter if you want to stick with passive designs... or at
least a wideband Wilkinson!?), but due to a lack of tools and practical RF
design/construction experience it never really happened.
My last year in grad school the motor burned out on the thing; I don't know if
they bothered to replace it. All the undergraduates doing various digital
logic boards were already using Advanced Circuits or -- if they had even more
time and fewer spare dollars -- the dirt-cheap overseas companies.
Interesting story: The one time that anyone in the department could recall a
student entering the "student" power amplifier design contest at IMS
(International Microwave Syposium -- the "big show" for those doing microwave
anything), said student was actually already working as a full time engineer
at a well-known company that designs amplifier MMICs and other RF ICs and had
access to a very nice set of equipment for prototyping and testing.
He still didn't come in particularly high on the list.
I thought about doing the same thing myself (in our department, I was one of a
long list of grad. students who went off and found a Real Job after finishing
their coursework but prior to getting around to finishing their thesis...),
but I never found/made the time. I did get as far as talking to Steve Cripps
(judge and of course well-known uwave PA designer... not to mention nice
guy...) and he mentioned that -- at the time -- all of the winning designs
were still significantly less power efficient than off-the-shelf commercial
offerings. Makes you wonder about the state of higher education a bit!
---Joel
