A 2.4GHz Power Amplifier Driver used in a WLAN IEEE 802.11b/g Transmitter Front-End

Abstract

This paper presents a 2.4 GHz power amplifier driver used in a WLAN IEEE 802.11b/g transmitter front-end which employs a walking IF architecture. The power amplifier driver is implemented in a 50 GHz 0.5 mum SiGe BiCMOS technology. And it consists of a differential cascode amplifier stage, an emitter follower and a common-emitter amplifier. It dissipates 28 mA current under a 3.3 V power supply, and occupies 0.5x0.56 mm2 die areas. The power amplifier driver exhibits 12dB power gain and delivers -10 dBm power to an off-chip power amplifier with 50 Omega input impedance. It has good suppression of LO and image spurs, and its IIP3 is +10.2 dBm.