Wireless Communication

Chapter: RF design and architectures


Power Consumption

 The power consumption of portable terminals is one of the main issues in wireless communications. Existing battery and other energy storage technologies appear a critical factor in the rapid introduction of some new services.

The power-consumption in a handheld transceivers highly depends on the distance to the base station. In cellular phones, for example, the transmit power of the power amplifier is routinely varied adaptively depending on path loss to the base station, both to save power and to reduce interference to other users.

According to Profs. Paul Gray and Robert Miller, there are excellent opportunities for continued progress in high-integration, low-cost RF transceivers to reduce power consumption. A key requirement for progress is close collaboration between transceiver and system designers and architects, RF and digital circuit designers, and device and package modeling engineers.

Mobile Phone Power Consumption

An Example 1


Ericsson Mobile Phone NH 237 for NMT.
This phone uses nickelmetal hydride batteries.

Talk Time: Standard Battery High Capacity Battery
1 watt 50 min 1 hr 40 min
0.6 watt 1 hr 2 hrs
Stand by 24 hrs 28 hrs
Talk-time per weight 0.3 min/gr 0.48 min/gr.

Example 2

Motorola introduced d470 GSM handsets in 1997, using NiMH batteries of 600 mAh or 1600 mAh. The 600 mAh set gives a talktime of 180 to 235 minutes and 60 to 75 hours of standby time. The 1600 mAh battery gives a talktime of 630 minutes.

Low Power Design for Wireless Systems

The Infopad research program addresses low-power design for wireless computing.



Wireless Communication © Jean-Paul M.G. Linnartz, 1993, 1995.