Customer Reviews

RF Microelectronics

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

When I first bought this book, I was very hopeful. The book seemed to cover a lot of relevant material, in a concise fashion. When I tried to read it however, I found it a little bit too much on the concise side. I have read very complicated books with a lot of math before, and I could follow them easier than this "easy" writing style. Almost every subject is covered in other books in more detail and better. Sometimes it's nice to have a simpler book which is an introduction, and that is what I was hoping for, but this just didn't do it for me.I donated the book to the library,as I felt I would never really get too much out of it. This didn't stop me from buying Mr. Razavi's "Design of Analog CMOS ICs " and I liked his tutorial in the IEEE Phase Lock Loop book he edited.I know he can do a better job.

This book covers a good deal of material in a very hot area. However, coverage is uneven with occasional mistakes. The book seems to be collected in a hurry some lecture notes. For example, the formula for the relationship between jitter and phase noise given at the beginning of the book is wrong (even units do not make sense) and is not the same for the expression given in the PLL chapter (it makes more sense).

I believe a good book on the field is yet to be written.

This book will help analog circuit designers who always wanted to learn what is going on the RF front. Most of the books on RF circuits are outdated and uses only discrete solutions. Author has done a wonderful job of providing a systematic approach to RF design. The key thing I like about this book is what to watch for in RF designs compared to conventional analog designs

Well, as I stated in other Dr. Razavi's book reviews, it's my pleasure to own and read every book written by Dr. Razavi. I have been waiting for this new edition for some time, and immediately purchased this 2nd edition from amazon.com once it's published. As an RF/analog engineer, I personally have benefited from all of his masterpieces. Many thanks for the author's great efforts, Dr. Razavi's books have influenced many engineers and students in the RF/analog area.

So, how is this 2nd edition? In my opinion, it might be inappropriate to call it "2nd edition" as this is a completely new book with vast improvements from the 1st edition. We have experienced a rapid growth of RF design within last decade, and this book covers most of the fundamentals of RF circuit/system design techniques to deal with today's challenges. It's understandable that some of the readers are not happy with the 1st edition in their reviews, but this new book is totally different (Dr. Razavi says there's only 10% overlap between two editions in his preface to the 2nd edition, it's absolutely true). Here is what I like most:

1. Dedicated chapters for LNA and mixers;
2. Great coverage on passive devices;
3. Three chapters to cover frequency synthesizers, which cover fundamentals, integer-N and fractional-N synthesizers;
4. Step-by-step tutorial of modern RF transceiver design;
5. In addition to all the new materials on RF systems and circuits, one of the biggest improvements is that the author incorporated hundreds examples/problems in the book. Some help readers understand RF fundamentals, and some are very practical issues facing RF engineers.

There are several errors in the book, make an online search you'll be able to find the errata to the 2nd edition.

And of course, the coverage of RF design by a single book is limited though it has over 900 pages. Here are some of my recommendations if you are interested in other RF/analog materials, and they are not related to this review:

Analog circuit design:
Analysis and Design of Analog Integrated Circuits
Design of Analog CMOS Integrated Circuits
CMOS Analog Circuit Design (The Oxford Series in Electrical and Computer Engineering)
CMOS Circuit Design, Layout, and Simulation, 3rd Edition (IEEE Press Series on Microelectronic Systems)
Analog Integrated Circuit Design

RF Systems and Circuits:
Radio Receiver Design
RF and Microwave Transmitter Design (Wiley Series in Microwave and Optical Engineering)
The Design of CMOS Radio-Frequency Integrated Circuits, Second Edition
RF System Design of Transceivers for Wireless Communications
Practical RF System Design

I have read large sections of this book and have been pleasantly surprised by the care and attention to detail taken with the description of RF design concepts as well as the mathematics used to clarify the issues.

The mathematics in particular seems to be free from errors, used only when necessary and does not contain such large jumps that the reader has to spend much effort trying to follow. All in all it is one of the best texts I have ever come across in this field of engineering

When I first bought this book, I was very hopeful. The book seemed to cover a lot of relevant material, in a concise fashion. When I tried to read it however, I found it a little bit too much on the concise side. I have read very complicated books with a lot of math before, and I could follow them easier than this "easy" writing style. Almost every subject is covered in other books in more detail and better. Sometimes it's nice to have a simpler book which is an introduction, and that is what I was hoping for, but this just didn't do it for me. I donated the book to the library, as I felt I would never really get too much out of it. This didn't stop me from buying Mr. Razavi's "Design of Analog CMOS ICs" and I liked his tutorial in the IEEE Phase Lock Loop book he edited. I know he can do a better job.

This is a repeat of a previous review I did. Since then I also read Mr. Razavi's book "Design of Integrated Circuits for Optical Communications" which was also concise but very nicely explained and I learned a lot from it.

This is the first book I used to learn about RF. It is well written and easy to follow. It does not have some of the new materials, but the fundamentals discussed in this book are still valid.

I found this book during my study maybe in library since 2000. This book is very good to introduced me to the filed of radio frequency circuit. I also bought the other 2 books, "Design of Analog CMOS integrated circuits" & " Design of Integrated for Optical communications" of Prof. Behzad from bookstore. But I think some parts are the same. I hope that the recent book " Fundamental of Microelectronics" have some differences from the others book because it has more than 900 pages. I am now prepared to do some research for RF power amplifier but from chapter9 of this book, it has not enough detail for me to do some research. Because recent book of Prof. Behzad is still expensive for me I will wait until the prices drop to less than 100USD

As a hardware design engineer, I am currently pursuing an 'economy' 900 MHz frequency hopped data modem design. I have limited experience with >200 MHz designs and found this book very useful in conveying techniques used at these higher freqs. Straight.. to the point discussions.. in which every sentence actually says something and instills insight. I esp found the sections on freq synthesis and oscillators to be informative. It's also a good reference to break out for descriptions of all the modulation techniques. However, I am still searching for that one text that performs in-depth analysis on the ever present / nebulous 'carrier recovery' and 'bit recovery' blocks.

Although it is a little bit old and there are so many other books on the subject, I still think that it is one of the bests. This book gives you a good basic knowledge of wireless circuits and systems. It's a good reference to look at too. In general, all books by BR are good, he is an incredible writer. His books are always very good to start with when you don't really know anything about the subject. As you get to know the subject more and more, you will know the value of the book and will discover more practical stuff in it. I totally recommend this one and all his books.