Introduction

Balanced measurements with a vector network analyzer are necessary for a number of applications. High-speed digital transmission lines are often employed on printed circuit boards (PCBs) to transport signals with extremely high bandwidths. It is important to be able to verify insertion loss, characteristic impedance, phase imbalance, and crosstalk to adjacent conductors. Antennas are sometimes fed with balanced lines as well, and verifying the return loss or VSWR of the balanced feed plus antenna combination is useful.

This article was published on the Microwave Journal website, and the remainder of the article can be read there.