How to Design a Stable High Frequency Amplifier

This short video series introduces stability analysis in high frequency circuit design. Stability analysis is becoming much more critical in modern high frequency applications because gain and coupling cause new problems to arise that are not easy to resolve in the lab. The first video is an introduction, presenting an example where a popular stability design technique called K-factor (or Rollet’s Stability Factor) is shown to give incorrect results. In doing a search for alternate techniques, engineers can quickly become overwhelmed by the breadth of approaches out there. How can circuit designers make sense out of all these techniques? Which one is correct? This video series will attempt to answer that question, and also introduce a new probe, called ws-probe in PathWave Advanced Design System (ADS) which can help to simplify stability analysis.