The WiMAX market may still lack maturity, but if it is ever to become a serious broadband alternative, quality of service will play an important role. To that end, Azimuth Systems, which in has produced multipath channel emulators for testing Wi-Fi systems in the past, has announced its first channel emulator platform for WiMAX.

The company’s ACE 400WB platform tests both single-input-single-output (SISO) and multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) WiMAX solutions (MIMO will be part of the WiMAX Forum’s Wave 2 Mobile WiMAX certification to take place later this year). The single-box solution provides automated channel modeling capabilities and enables real-time performance testing of MIMO devices, streamlining the testing of WiMAX chipsets, clients and infrastructure.

The ACE 400WB emulates multipath characteristics with channel correlation to determine the effect of multichannel RF interactions. The advanced signal processing technology is integrated in a platform that automates device control, traffic capture and results display. It can be used to test and debug MIMO algorithms, optimize the performance of WiMAX devices in MIMO and SISO environments, streamline quality assurance processes, and run competitive performance benchmark tests. The ACE 400WB also tests interoperability between MIMO and SISO implementations from multiple vendors and can be used to define industry-wide mobility performance test suites for future WiMAX products.

Azimuth was scheduled to demonstrate its new system at last week’s WiMAX Forum Member Conference in Waikoloa, Hawaii.

Putting GPES testing on the map

Aeroflex has launched an integrated solution for testing mobile handsets enabled with Assisted-Global Positioning System (A-GPS) technology. The solution is based on the company’s 6103 AIME and 6103 AIME/CT mobile handset test systems, but is additionally designed to address rapidly emerging development and conformance test requirements for A-GPS by testing handset implementation in the laboratory. This eliminates the need for costly field trials and reduces time to market. The solution is designed to support the development lifecycle of A-GPS devices from initial R&D through to conformance testing.

Providing full GSM/GPRS and Unlicensed Mobile Access network emulation, the platforms, together with software environments for development and conformance testing, allow an operator to observe the behavior of a mobile handset operating against an emulated wireless network.

To create the A-GPS mobile handset test solution, Aeroflex has fully integrated Navigation Laboratories’ 12-channel NLC–L1–AGPS Constellation Simulator with the 6103 AIME and AIME/CT platforms. It supports both MS-Based and MS-Assisted positioning methods, as well as conventional GPS, and provides analysis of the pseudo-range as well as latitude/longitude location response for the unit under test.