Automatic hybrid test stations for software-defined radios

Rapid growth in the development and production of software-defined radios encourages some countries to manufacture their own radios by the use of new technology transfer agreements. Deployment of the automatic test equipment is a fundamental step of transfer of technology. As the automatic test equipments will be scattered throughout the world, the test systems should be designed accordingly to meet the new needs introduced. Since the cost of maintaining old systems is more expensive, using the existing automatic test systems and updating them according to the newly introduced needs is not an option. This fact encourages us to take a big step and design a completely new automatic test system. This paper introduces the new challenges encountered in the design, deployment and maintenance processes and describes the structure of the developed automatic test system in detail. The system described in this paper covers the typical automatic test equipment units like test and measurement devices, switching units, input/output components, loads and test software. However, the main focus of the paper is on the new test software introduced.