As mobile carriers move toward 5G, major players in the embedded-system arena are following suit with more powerful chipsets. Broadcom recently introduced two new systems-on-chip (SoCs), said to be two of the first to deliver 5-Gb/s speeds. According to the company, the integrated chipsets can deliver four times the spectral efficiency than previous devices for microwave backhaul. The SoCs are specifically designed to support the surge of data traffic over wireless networks.
The BCM85650 features integrated cross-polarization interference cancellation (XPIC) and line-of-sight multiple-input, multiple-output (LoS-MIMO) functionalities. This helps boost spectral efficiency to 48 bits/s/Hz by supporting flexible antenna placement and reducing external connection and hardware requirements. It includes a dual-core wideband modem and supports advanced channel aggregation functionality for efficient capacity doubling. The SoC also offers quadrature amplitude modulation (4K-QAM).
The BCM85820 boosts both capacity and spectral efficiency thanks to integration of XPIC, MIMO, 4K-QAM, 112-MHz channels, and channel-aggregation functionality. It also utilizes advanced digital RF correction mechanisms like adaptive digital-pre-distortion (ADPD) to achieve high system gain. The chipset includes a full transceiver as well as synthesizer components.
Though both chipsets are currently sampling, their introduction represents a key step toward meeting increased traffic demands spawned by 5G and LTE technology. Such devices make it possible to expand capacity and coverage across a wider network to augment the existing microwave backhaul infrastructure.