[time-nuts] ADEV vs MDEV

Bruce Griffiths bruce.griffiths at xtra.co.nz
Sat Feb 6 20:30:35 UTC 2010


To a first approximation injection locking alters the loop parameters so 
its important to measure the actual PLL characteristics with the loop 
closed and not just use the PLL parameters inferred from the OCXO EFC 
transfer function etc.

The noise of the OCXO used as a VCXO will limit the noise floor.
An ADEV noise floor of 1E-13 isnt likely when using an HP10811A as the 
VCXO for example.

Bruce

Bob Camp wrote:
> Hi
>
> It's possible / likely to injection lock with the tight loop approach 
> and get data that's much better than reality. A lot depends on the 
> specific oscillators under test and the buffers (if any) between the 
> oscillators and mixer.
>
> If your OCVCXO has a tuning slope of 0.1 ppm / volt then a part in 
> 10^14 is going to be at the 100 of nanovolts level. Certainly not 
> impossible, but it does present it's own set of issues. Lab gear to do 
> it is available, but not all that common. DC offsets and their 
> temperature coefficients along with thermocouple effects could make 
> things exciting.
>
> There is no perfect way to do any of this, only a lot of compromises 
> here or there. Each approach has stuff you need to watch out for.
>
> Bob
>
> --------------------------------------------------
> From: "WarrenS" <warrensjmail-one at yahoo.com>
> Sent: Saturday, February 06, 2010 2:19 PM
> To: "Discussion of precise time and frequency measurement" 
> <time-nuts at febo.com>
> Subject: Re: [time-nuts] ADEV vs MDEV
>
>>
>> Peat said:
>>> I would appreciate any comments or observations on the topic of 
>>> apparatus with demonstrated stability measurements.
>>> My motivation is to discover the SIMPLEST scheme for making 
>>> stability measurements at the 1E-13 in 1s  performance level.
>>
>>
>> If you accept that the measurement is going to limited by the 
>> Reference Osc,
>> for Low COST and SIMPLE, with the ability to measure ADEVs at that 
>> level,
>> Can't beat a simple analog version of  NIST's "Tight Phase-Lock Loop 
>> Method of measuring Freq stability".
>> http://tf.nist.gov/phase/Properties/one.htm#oneone    Fig 1.7
>>
>>
>> By replacing the "Voltage to freq converter, Freq counter & Printer 
>> with a Radio shack type PC data logging DVM,
>> It can be up and running from scratch in under an Hr, with no high 
>> end test equipment needed.
>> If you want performance that exceeds the best of most DMTD at low Tau 
>> it takes a little more work
>> and a higher speed oversampling ADC data logger and a good offset 
>> voltage.
>>
>> I must add this is not a popular solution (Or a general Purpose one) but
>> IF  you know analog and have a GOOD osc with EFC to use for the 
>> reference,
>> as far as I've been able to determine it is the BEST SIMPLE answer 
>> that allows High performance.
>> Limited by My HP10811 Ref OSC, I'm getting better than 1e-12 in 0.1 
>> sec (at 30 Hz Bandwidth)
>>
>> Basic modified NIST Block Diag attached:
>> The NIST paper sums it up quite nicely:
>> 'It is not difficult to achieve a sensitivity of a part in e14 per Hz 
>> resolution
>> so one has excellent precision capabilities with this system.'
>>
>> This does not address your other question of ADEV vs MDEV,
>> What I've described is just a simple way to get the Low cost, GOOD 
>> Raw data.
>> What you then do with that Data is a different subject.
>>
>> You can run the raw data thru one of the many ADEV programs out 
>> there, 'Plotter' being my choice.
>>
>>
>> Have fun
>> ws
>>
>> *************
>>
>> [time-nuts] ADEV vs MDEV
>> Pete Rawson peterawson at earthlink.net
>> Sat Feb 6 03:59:18 UTC 2010
>>
>> Efforts are underway to develop a low cost DMTD apparatus with
>> demonstrated stability measurements of 1E-13 in 1s. It seems that
>> existing TI counters can reach this goal in 10s. (using MDEV estimate
>> or 100+s. using ADEV estimate). The question is; does the MDEV tool
>> provide an appropriate measure of stability in this time range, or is
>> the ADEV estimate a more correct answer?
>>
>> The TI performance I'm referring to is the 20-25 ps, single shot TI,
>> typical for theHP5370A/B, the SR620 or the CNT81/91. I have data
>> from my CNT81showing MDEV < 1E-13 in 10s. and I believe the
>> other counters behave similarly.
>>
>> I would appreciate any comments or observations on this topic.
>> My motivation is to discover the simplest scheme for making
>> stability measurements at this performance level; this is NOT
>> even close to the state-of-the-art, but can still be useful.
>>
>> Pete Rawson
>>
>>
>
>
>
>> _______________________________________________
>> time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts at febo.com
>> To unsubscribe, go to 
>> https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts
>> and follow the instructions there. 
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts at febo.com
> To unsubscribe, go to 
> https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts
> and follow the instructions there.
>






More information about the Time-nuts_lists.febo.com mailing list