Electronic – What kind of oscillator circuit technology is used for 5G technology

cellphoneoscillatorRFwireless

In particular, are 5G oscillators found in cellphones using some kind of SMT/fabricated Gunn diode or Impatt diode(on a chip)? The frequency bands(K band) are beyond the range of crystal oscillators. But what other kinds of technology is used to generate oscillators this high in frequency using solid state?

Best Answer

The frequency is indeed out of range of a crystal oscillator. But you don't need a crystal to generate your fundamental directly. In fact, all previous frequency bands used in 2G/3G/4G are also out of range of these crystals.

The trick is to use a PLL. Modern CMOS circuit technologies can product fundamental oscillators past 150 GHz* - making one that oscillates at 30-40 GHz is not that difficult. You then use some kind of divider/mixer/counter to compare it with the crystal or MEMS oscillator that might be at 100 MHz or lower, and use the result to tweak the oscillating frequency of your high-frequency oscillator. The added advantage of this is that by tweaking the divider ratio, you can change the frequency of the high-frequency oscillator (for example to switch to a different channel), without needing a different reference.

*That was with planar CMOS, don't know how finfet performs since it's Ft/Fmax is generally lower than planar/FD-SOI