Agilent 86143B Data Sheet

Agilent 8614xB Family of Optical Spectrum Analyzers

Optical Spectrum Analyzers

8614xB

Testing at the speed of light

The Agilent Family of
Optical Spectrum Analyzers

Agilent Technologies offers a wide
variety of optical spectrum analyzers
(OSA) to meet your test needs whether
it’s in R&D, manufacturing, installation,
or maintenance and commissioning.
Providing both benchtop and portable
models at different price and perfor­mance points so you can choose the
most cost effective solution to meet
your test needs.

Benchtop’s - The OSA family of bench-

tops provides fast, accurate, and com­prehensive measurement capabilities
for spectral analysis. Standard Com­mands for Programmable Instruments
(SCPI) over LAN and the display-off
features allows you to make fast mea­surements while reducing production
test time. Remote file saving and printing,
and full featured SCPI remote commands
make it easy to integrate Agilent’s
OSA’s into your production line.

Portable’s - Rugged, reliable and

easy to use with performance
you would not expect from a por­table OSA. The user-friendly interface
and intelligent measurement design
take the uncertainty out of making
complicated spectral measurements.
Measurements you can trust each and
every time.

Benchtop Overview

Portable Overview

High performance OSA with

86146B filter mode monochromator

output

86142B High performance OSA

86140B Standard performance OSA

Standard performance OSA

86144B with filter mode monochrom-

ator output

86145B High performance OSA

86143B Standard performance OSA

More insight than you ever thought possible...

Family

You can choose the most cost effective
solution to meet your test needs.

2

Filter Mode

Introducing the brightest members of
the family...

The 86146B benchtop OSA and
86144B portable OSA enable new test
methods you may never have thought
possible. One of the applications of
the filter mode is to allow a single
tightly spaced DWDM signal to be
isolated. You can then quantitatively
analyze in the time domain without
losing any of the traditional OSA func­tionality you’ve come to expect from
Agilent. It is now possible to switch
between parametric measurements in
the physical domain to functional
measurements in the time domain.

The WDM application can sequentially
or selectively drop WDM channels that
require additional analysis.

The 86146B and 86144B provide the
flexibility to drop a single DWDM
channel as tight as 12.5 GHz spacing
with fast-tuning speed, low-insertion
loss, and highly repeatable wave­length accuracy. We’ve also designed

The 86146B benchtop OSA and 86144B
portable OSA enable new test methods you
may never have thought possible.

3

Filter Mode

our built-in WDM application to
work with the single-mode mono­chromator output path to simplify
the task of pre-selecting a desired
WDM channel for analysis.

Another application of the filter mode
is to measure time resolved chirp (TRC).
Using the SMF feature of monochrom­ator out as a preselector with a DCA,
chirp measurements can be made on
lasers.

NT

NT

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NT

λ1

λ2

λn–1

λn

λ1

λ2

λn–1

λn

NT

NT

NT

NT

Demultiplexer

Wavelength Converter

Monitor

Points

Multiplexer

Network Terminals

Wavelength Converter

Accelerate Test with
Built-in Applications

Built-in applications take the uncer­tainty out of measurements for WDM
systems, lasers, amplifiers, and pas­sive components. These applications
allow for fast, accurate, easy to use,
upgradeable, and repeatable measure­ments of critical parameters. All of
these applications can be added
through a simple firmware upgrade.

WDM Application

The WDM application helps speed
up the test process for DWDM sub­systems, so increasing channel counts
does not mean test time increases.
The application can easily measure
DWDM sub-system components, such
as transmission sub-systems, optical
add/drop multiplexers, and multiplex­ers/de-multiplexers.

This application provides accurate
measurements for critical parameters
such as optical signal-to-noise ratio
(OSNR), channel wavelength, channel
power, and span tilt. The application
also provides both a graphical display
of your WDM signal as well as tabular
data. Each channel is automatically
numbered so that test data can be
easily correlated to each channel.

OSNR measurements of modulated
signals made with the 8614xB series
are highly accurate due to the patented
dual sweep method. The first sweep
is taken at a user-specified wide
resolution bandwidth filter to ensure
accurate signal amplitude measure­ments. The second sweep is taken
with a user-specified narrow resolution
bandwidth filter to ensure accurate
noise power spectral density measure­ments. With the fast sweep speed of
the Agilent OSA, the result is a quick
and accurate OSNR measurement.

These applications allow for fast, accurate,
easy to use, upgradeable, and repeatable
measurements.

Passive Component Test
Application

The passive component test applica­tion simplifies the test procedure for
passive components, such as filters,
couplers, and isolators.

A user defined test plan allows you to
customize and stream line the process
to measure and display important device
parameters such as insertion and
return loss, bandwidth, and filter shape.

4

Source Test Application

The 8614xB series offers automated
optical source and laser characterization.

Distributed feedback (DFB), Fabry­Perot (FP) lasers and LED sources are
key components for enabling trans­mission of information in fiber optic
systems. To ensure proper operation
of sources key parameters need to be
measured.

The source test application provides
easy-to-setup and easy-to-use mea­surements. This application is design­ed to provide accurate results for the
following critical parameters; side
mode suppression ratio, center wave­length, mode spacing, channel power.

A single button press
starts the application and
provides on-screen
instructions to step you
through the measurement
procedure.

5

Applications

Amplifier Test Application

The amplifier test application in
the 8614xB series simplifies the
process of characterizing gain and
noise figure of optical amplifiers such
as EDFA’s, SOA’s and Raman amplifiers
which facilitates in reducing test time.

This application is simple to configure
and easy to use. A single button press
starts the application and provides on­screen instructions to step you through
the measurement procedure. This
application utilizes the ISS (Interpola­ted Source Subtraction) method to
quickly measure gain and noise figure
at a single wavelength or at many
simultaneous wavelengths. The ISS
method interpolates
the calibrated noise
power measurements
at either side of the
signal to determine the
noise power component
hidden beneath the
signal. The measure­ment data can be
displayed graphically
or in tabular format.

Benchtop and
Portable Solutions

Large color Display

A large 26.4 cm (10.4 in) color LCD
display with exceptional brightness
and clarity for ergonomic viewing.

6

Remote File Save

Save test data directly
to a file share on a
network drive to simplify
test automation.

Graphical User Interface

Control the OSA from the front
panel or with an external keyboard
and mouse. You can even remotely
control the OSA from a PC or work­station on the LAN.

Traces

Six independent traces with
extensive trace math capability
make it easy to see complex
measurement data in a single
graphical display.

Applications

Internal applications help streamline production
test and increase utilization. New applications
can be installed through an upgrade procedure in
minutes providing you with a path for the next
generation of devices.

SCPI Over LAN

The OSA can now be controlled over LAN or GPIB using
SCPI. This industry standard programming structure insures
that the test plans you write for today’s automated test
equipment will work with tomorrow’s instrumentation.

Internal Printer

Graphics and tabular data can
be captured in an instant with
the internal printer.

Remote Printing

Send a screen capture
or data table to any
printer on the LAN.

7

The Big Picture

Display Off

With the “DISPLAY OFF”
feature, the instrument is
focused on making fast
measurements.

The Internal EELED broadband

light source is ideal for passive
component test and reduces the
number of instruments required
to perform passive component
measurements.

Internal Wavelength Calibrator

The internal gas cell calibrator allows you to
achieve ±10 pm wavelength accuracy between
1480 to 1565 nm. An external wavelength meter
can extend this 10 pm accuracy across the
entire OSA measurement range.

Filter Mode (86144B & 86146B)

Easily select and isolate a single tightly
spaced DWDM channel and drop it
out. Connect the filter mode OSA to a
digital communications analyzer or bit
error ratio tester for analysis in the
electrical domain.

Research and Development

Speed your time to market...

Research and development contin­ues to push the limit of technology,
whether it’s by increasing spectral
density of WDM systems or taming
the elusive soliton.

Agilent OSA’s can help you with these
leading test needs.

The high performance OSA models have
excellent measurement specifications
to help you with the more traditional
tasks of product development includ­ing the highest wavelength accuracy
(±10 pm), low polarization loss (0.05 dB),
low insertion loss (<10 dB), and high
dynamic range (–70 dB at 0.5 nm).

Any of the four independent markers
can be arbitrarily set on any of the six
available traces, so any absolute or
relative value can be measured. Further­more, each marker can measure
bandwidth and calibrated optical
signal-to-noise ratio quickly. The noise
markers provide calibrated noise
power normalized to a standard 0.1 nm
noise equivalent bandwidth automat­ically for any resolution bandwidth
setting. Thus, eliminating steps and
reducing your time to market.

The graphical user interface can be
operated directly or by using an exter­nal keyboard and mouse.

R&D

8

Manufacturing

Boost your time to revenue...

Agilent’s wide range of OSA’s have
exceptional measurement speed and
reliability, leaving you the choice to
select the most cost effective solution
for your test needs. Agilent’s two year
calibration cycles and excellent sup­port services means that you can keep
downtime and cost-of-ownership to a
bare minimum. The
8614xB automatically
maximizes sweep
speed while main­taining the required
dynamic range. This
variable sensitivity
allows you to get the
fastest sweep time
possible increasing
throughput, while high
accuracy allows you
to minimize guard
bands and increase
product yields.

The variable sensitivity range allows you
to get the fastest sweep speed possible

9

Manufacturing

The 8614xB’s are designed for
LAN connectivity so that you can
save production data, screen shots,
and even remotely control or monitor
the OSA from any PC connected to the
LAN. Integration of the OSA onto your
manufacturing floor has never been
easier.

Not a Performance Lightweight

Life in the field can be tough so your
test equipment needs to be tougher.
The portable OSA’s are a smaller
ruggedized version with the same high
performance design used in the bench­top OSA.

Measurements you take during system
verification test or production final test
using the benchtop OSA’s correlate
with measurements taken on-site in
the field with Agilent portables. And if

there’s a tough problem in the

field requiring remote

monitoring, the OSA’s

are web-enabled,

allowing engi-

neers to con-

nect from a

computer

anywhere.

It’s full-featured remote interface
means that it’s just as easy to use
and control remotely as it is on your
lab bench.

Agilent’s portable OSA’s are well
suited for monitoring WDM sig­nals. Their low-insertion loss,
built-in printer and channel drop
application means that you can
capture the data you need without
interfering with normal system
operation.

The bright display and extensive
trace capabilities means that you can
see a large amount of information
in less than optimum conditions.

Installation & Maintenance

The OSA’s are web-enabled, allowing
engineers to connect to it from a
computer anywhere anytime.

10

Agilent Technologies OSA family ­a whole product solution

11

Solutions

PC connectivity

• VXI plug and play drivers

• LAN, Serial, Parallel, VGA, GPIB, Mouse, Keyboard, and external trigger ports

• Web enabled

Pre-sales service

• Rentals, leasing, and finance

• Application engineering services

• Application and product notes

Post-sales support

• Standard one year global warranty

• Two year calibration cycle

• Worldwide call center and service center support network

Product and peripheral interfaces

• Remote front panel

• Remote print and file save

• Web enabled

Instrument drivers

• SCPI (Standard Commands for Programmable Instruments)

• Instrument drivers available

Training and access to information

• English, Japanese, and Chinese manuals available in hardcopy or via the web

• Application notes

Firmware upgrade available through

• Web: www.agilent.com/comms/OSAupgrade

• CD ROM

• LAN

The performance of Agilent’s OSA family is only a small part of what you get
from Agilent Technologies. Agilent strives to provide complete solutions
that go beyond our customer’s expectations. Only Agilent offers the depth
and breadth of enhancements, software, services, connectivity, accessibility,
and support to help our customers reach their measurement objectives.

LabVIEW

Agilent VEE

VisualBasic

C++

LabVIEW

Agilent VEE

VisualBasic

C++

Agilent Technologies’
Test and Measurement Support, Services, and Assistance

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problems. We strive to ensure that you get the test and measurement capabilities you paid for and
obtain the support you need. Our extensive support resources and services can help you choose
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Promise” and “Your Advantage.”

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Our Promise means your Agilent test and measurement equipment will meet its advertised
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By internet, phone, or fax, get assistance with all your test & measurement needs.

Online assistance:

www.agilent.com/comms/lightwave

Phone or Fax

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(tel) 1 800 452 4844

Canada:

(tel) 1 877 894 4414
(fax) [phone]

China:

(tel) 800-810-0189
(fax) 1-0800-650-0121

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Product specifications and descriptions in this document subject to change without notice.

© 2001 Agilent Technologies, Inc.
Printed in USA November 1, 2001
5988-4699EN