[time-nuts] Simulation of oscillator noise

Wolfgang Wallner wolfgang-wallner at gmx.at
Thu Nov 28 09:35:33 UTC 2013


Hello Time-Nuts community,

I'm interested in the simulation of oscillator noise (especially in discrete event simulators).
I came across this topic as part of the literature research for my master's thesis, and have to admit that I really underestimated how complex this topic is.
In the past weeks, I have spent a lot of time reading about different kinds of variances, and I think I have a basic understanding now.

I would like to ask you two questions:

1) Do you have any advice for me on what papers to read concerning oscillator noise simulation?

I have read different kinds of papers up to now, but non of them was really what I was looking for:

*) One of the papers I have read is "Accurate Clock Models for Simulating Wireless Sensor Networks" by Ferrari, Meier and Thiele.
But I don't think their simple model is of any use, as they completely ignore the typical allan variance of oscillators.
*) On the other hand, the paper "Achieving a Realistic Notion of Time in Discrete Event Simulation" by Gaderer, Nagy, Loschmidt and Sauter describes a very realistic model, but they keep the implementation details to themselves.
*) What could be of use for my purpose could be "Simulation of Oscillator Noise" by Barnes, but as it is from 1988 it is quite dated.

2) Do you know any public data samples of the allan variance of a real oscillators?

When I look in the data sheets of oscillator that I find on the internet, they only have precision estimates like 1ppm or 1ppb, but no detailed allan variance graphs.

Best regards,
Wolfgang Wallner

PS: When I use the word oscillator I mean the cheap quartz oscillators as found in typical consumer electronic stuff.
PPS: I'm not sure if this mailing-list is the right place to ask my questions, as simulation is not listed in your mailing-list topics. Sorry if this mail is off-topic.




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