China 3G Spec Wins More Handset Test Support

TAIPEI, Taiwan — Another test and measurement company is updating its product line to support China's domestic 3G standard. Willtek Communications is the latest vendor to add in TD-SCDMA testing capability in anticipation of a ramp-up in demand for handsets and data cards once the 3G technology is licensed next year.

A shortage of test equipment supporting the TD-SCDMA standard has been a bottleneck in helping iron out wrinkles in the nascent 3G standard. Over the past couple months, a few companies have been filling in that gap. In October, Tektronix Inc. said it would add TD-SCDMA as an option to its NetTek Wireless RF Field Tester, which should make it easier for companies to diagnose Node B transmitter problems.

However, in general, more support is still needed in the test environment.

Willtek's 4400 mobile phone tester series is used in factories to test phones. It calibrates the phone's transceiver, carries out functional tests, and final tests before shipment. These measurements include peak and average power, open and inner loop power, error vector magnitude, frequency error, peak code domain power, spectrum, constellation display, BER and BLER, the company said.

Willtek said the 4400 facilitates interoperability by using the TD-SCDMA protocol stack from Datang Mobile. It also uses protocols co-developed with Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications.