Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Intermediate frequency
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Conversion to an intermediate frequency is useful for several reasons. The IF stage from a Motorola 19K1
When several stages of filters are used, they can all be set to a fixed television set circa 1949.
frequency, which makes them easier to build and to tune. Lower
frequency transistors generally have higher gains so fewer stages are
required. It's easier to make sharply selective filters at lower fixed frequencies.
There may be several such stages of intermediate frequency in a superheterodyne receiver; two or three stages are
called double (alternatively, dual) or triple conversion, respectively.
Contents
1 Reasons for using IF
2 Uses
3 History
4 Commonly used intermediate frequencies
5 See also
6 References
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intermediate_frequency 1/4
2/22/2017 Intermediate frequency - Wikipedia
A second reason, in receivers that can be tuned to different frequencies, is to convert the various different
frequencies of the stations to a common frequency for processing. It is difficult to build multistage amplifiers, filters,
and detectors that can have all stages track in tuning different frequencies, but it is comparatively easy to build
tunable oscillators. Superheterodyne receivers tune in different frequencies by adjusting the frequency of the local
oscillator on the input stage, and all processing after that is done at the same fixed frequency, the IF. Without using
an IF, all the complicated filters and detectors in a radio or television would have to be tuned in unison each time the
frequency was changed, as was necessary in the early tuned radio frequency receivers. A more important
advantage is that it gives the receiver a constant bandwidth over its tuning range. The bandwidth of a filter is
proportional to its center frequency. In receivers like the TRF in which the filtering is done at the incoming RF
frequency, as the receiver is tuned to higher frequencies its bandwidth increases.
The main reason for using an intermediate frequency is to improve frequency selectivity.[1] In communication
circuits, a very common task is to separate out or extract signals or components of a signal that are close together in
frequency. This is called filtering. Some examples are, picking up a radio station among several that are close in
frequency, or extracting the chrominance subcarrier from a TV signal. With all known filtering techniques the filter's
bandwidth increases proportionately with the frequency. So a narrower bandwidth and more selectivity can be
achieved by converting the signal to a lower IF and performing the filtering at that frequency. FM and television
broadcasting with their narrow channel widths, as well as more modern telecommunications services such as cell
phones and cable television, would be impossible without using frequency conversion.[5]
Uses
Perhaps the most commonly used intermediate frequencies for broadcast receivers are around 455 kHz for AM
receivers and 10.7 MHz for FM receivers. In special purpose receivers other frequencies can be used. A dual-
conversion receiver may have two intermediate frequencies, a higher one to improve image rejection and a second,
lower one, for desired selectivity. A first intermediate frequency may even be higher than the input signal, so that all
undesired responses can be easily filtered out by a fixed-tuned RF stage.[6]
In a digital receiver, the analog to digital converter (ADC) operates at low sampling rates, so input RF must be
mixed down to IF to be processed. Intermediate frequency tends to be lower frequency range compared to the
transmitted RF frequency. However, the choices for the IF are most dependent on the available components such
as mixer, filters, amplifiers and others that can operate at lower frequency. There are other factors involved in
deciding the IF frequency, because lower IF is susceptible to noise and higher IF can cause clock jitters.
Modern satellite television receivers use several intermediate frequencies.[7] The 500 television channels of a typical
system are transmitted from the satellite to subscribers in the Ku microwave band, in two subbands of 10.7 - 11.7
and 11.7 - 12.75 GHz. The downlink signal is received by a satellite dish. In the box at the focus of the dish, called
a low-noise block downconverter (LNB), each block of frequencies is converted to the IF range of 950 -
2150 MHz by two fixed frequency local oscillators at 9.75 and 10.6 GHz. One of the two blocks is selected by a
control signal from the set top box inside, which switches on one of the local oscillators. This IF is carried into the
building to the television receiver on a coaxial cable. At the cable company's set top box, the signal is converted to
a lower IF of 480 MHz for filtering, by a variable frequency oscillator.[7] This is sent through a 30 MHz bandpass
filter, which selects the signal from one of the transponders on the satellite, which carries several channels. Further
processing selects the channel desired, demodulates it and sends the signal to the television.
History
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intermediate_frequency 2/4
2/22/2017 Intermediate frequency - Wikipedia
An intermediate frequency was first used in the superheterodyne radio receiver, invented by American scientist
Major Edwin Armstrong in 1918, during World War I.[8][9] A member of the Signal Corps, Armstrong was
building radio direction finding equipment to track German military signals at the then-very high frequencies of 500
to 3500 kHz. The triode vacuum tube amplifiers of the day would not amplify stably above 500 kHz, however, it
was easy to get them to oscillate above that frequency. Armstrong's solution was to set up an oscillator tube that
would create a frequency near the incoming signal, and mix it with the incoming signal in a 'mixer' tube, creating a
'heterodyne' or signal at the lower difference frequency, where it could be amplified easily. For example, to pick up
a signal at 1500 kHz the local oscillator would be tuned to 1450 kHz. Mixing the two created an intermediate
frequency of 50 kHz, which was well within the capability of the tubes.
After the war, in 1920, Armstrong sold the patent for the superheterodyne to Westinghouse, who subsequently sold
it to RCA. The increased complexity of the superheterodyne circuit compared to earlier regenerative or tuned radio
frequency receiver designs slowed its use, but the advantages of the intermediate frequency for selectivity and static
rejection eventually won out; by 1930, most radios sold were 'superhets'. During the development of radar in
World War II, the superheterodyne principle was essential for downconversion of the very high radar frequencies to
intermediate frequencies. Since then, the superheterodyne circuit, with its intermediate frequency, has been used in
virtually all radio receivers.
See also
Mechanical filter
Low IF receiver
References
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intermediate_frequency 3/4
2/22/2017 Intermediate frequency - Wikipedia
1. F. Langford Smith (ed) Radiotron Designer's Handbook, 3rd Edition (Wireless Press 1946) Page 99
2. Army Technical Manual TM 11-665: C-W and A-M Radio Transmitters and Receivers. US Dept. of the Army.
1952. pp. 195197.
3. Rembovsky, Anatoly; Ashikhmin, Alexander; Kozmin, Vladimir; et al. (2009). Radio Monitoring: Problems,
Methods and Equipment. Springer Science and Business Media. p. 26. ISBN 0387981004.
4. The 1946 Radiotron Designer's Handbook observes on page 159 that some short-wave receivers operate with an
IF of 1600 kHz and that "At such a high frequency one or two additional IF stages are required are necessary to
provide sufficient gain."
5. Dixon, Robert (1998). Radio Receiver Design. CRC Press. pp. 5761. ISBN 0824701615.
6. Wes Hayward, Doug De Maw (ed),Solid state design for the radio amateur, (American Radio Relay League, 1977)
pp. 82-87
7. Lundstrom, Lars-Ingemar Lundstrom (2006). Understanding Digital Television: An Introduction to DVB Systems
with Satellite, Cable, Broadband and Terrestrial. US: Taylor & Francis. pp. 8183. ISBN 0240809068.
8. Redford, John (February 1996). "Edwin Howard Armstrong". Doomed Engineers. John Redford's personal
website. Retrieved 2008-05-10.
9. alisdair. "Superheterodyne". everything.com. Retrieved 2008-05-10.
10. Ravalico D. E., Radioelementi, Milan, Hoepli, 1992.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intermediate_frequency 4/4