A fast SAR measurements system for production testing of personal wireless devices

The SAR (Specific Absorption Rate) evaluation is mandatory for any wireless device in the market today (mobile phone, laptop, tablet etc). Therefore, SAR has to be considered in all stages of the product life: R&D, production, product certification, sales and after-sales. International standards which provide SAR evaluation protocols are likely to be modified to integrate the hand effect on SAR performances [1]. This implies an increasing number of required SAR measurements in any certification and testing scenario. A further increase in SAR measurements on each device also results from the increasing number of services and frequency bands of modern devices (4G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth etc). These factors greatly increase the time spent on overall SAR evaluation of each device. This paper presents a multi-probe fast SAR measurement system, SARlite, developed for easy application in any stage of development or production of the wireless device. The fast 3D evaluation allows a considerable reduction in SAR measurement time, while maintaining good precision.