ads antenna design

Any 2.5D EM-Simulator can simulate the microstrip antenna. You can use the Sonnet, MWO etc. Also, You can use the 3D EM-Simulator (CST-MWS, @nsoft HFSS (not so good) or IE3D).

Best regards,
Kit-the-great

If you can't pay the price of those expensive software described by Kit the great but still want a good simulation package, you can go to:

http://www.e-technik.fh-kiel.de/~splitt/html/mstrip.htm

for a full and free version of Mstrip40.

Cheers,
Element7k

You people are all talking about simulation software. A good design software for antennas is PCAAD.

I still think that the HFSS is the best.

PCAAD is only use of basic antenna design. I think useful if you don't want to know much about antenna theory and is going for conventional design to be place into the cheap production quickly but not very useful for serious antenna antennas.

Element7k

I could not agree more that CST, HFSS and other EM simulators is the best TOOL to simulate and optomize antennas.

These tools are NOT design tools. PCAAD and a good old pen an paper are DESIGN tools.

A DESIGN tool must take design parameters and spit out physical dims which are then used for simulation and optomization.

If addressing beano040461 problem I totally agree that PCCAD is very useful as a "calculator" and of course a good design tool. Even Ansoft designer has included some of these features. But with regards to other solutions, PCCAD has limited design capabilities with solution only possible with common antenna geometry. Using these simulation software, lots of antennas can be designed through "trial and error" without pen and paper. I'm not sure if its much of a "design" process but hey-ho! These antennas works! I recall someone mentioned in one of the forum that he/she has never seen an accomplished antenna enginner sitting behind a Pentium 4 and this is absolutely true.

How true it is. Some really good stuff in antennas was done before computers were practical.

I have seen this in many technology areas. People who operate computer programs without knowing the basics of the physical world. Computer programs should be used to verify a paper design.

Here are some classical examples. One person used a linear small signal microwave circuit simulator to show that limiters do not suppress noise or smaller signals.
One very large company expert on microwave filters did not know that resonator and transmission line filters have infinite alternating pass and stop bands.

A radio system was designed based on the spurs generated by the simulator program being quantized in amplitude and time. They adjusted the design to map the spurs into the desired signal where they could not be seen.

One expert on operting one program claimed that the LO leakage of a mixer was caused by a band pass filter several amplifier stages down stream being improperly terminated. His design had the RF signal level 35 dB below the suggested optimum level of the mixer IC data sheet. Once the levels were changed, the system worked to specifications.

did u try zeland9 I think it's small and good
With my best Rgds
Amr

I think CST is the best choice.

:roll:
when compare the Microwave EDA tools we can find the smallest is AWR MWoffice,then the ansoft....,but why ads is so big and lagre?

In my view, really depends on what kind of antennas you are designing. If mostly metal, then use a simulation software that uses method of moments. Its fast and efficent. If your structure contain large number inhomogeneous material or if your antenna has certain steady state criteria to be met, then use a FIT/FEM based simulation software. Of course, finally depend on the amount of SSS you have in your pocket :P

Agilent ADS is an other choice. But it can only simulate 2D results. So I prefer HFSS** which can simulate 3D results.

HFSS is a great industry-used standard for antenna simulation. It uses the finite element method to do it's EM computation.

There is also SONNET or IE3D that uses Moment Method.

CST microwave studio, Ansoft Ensemble, IE3D, Sonnet, XFDTD are all good for plannar antenna simulation. No one is better than the others because simulation is only the first step in antenna design. :)

You must enter right parameters for EM simulation, every increase numbers of cells increase time of simulation several times.
EM algoritms like FDTD (XFDTD,ZELAND,CST MWS,ANSOFT) are very robust and you must have very fast processor or processors.
If you are beginer try with algorithm based on Method of Moments. One programm based on this algorithm is NEC, it's faster several times then FDTD based programms.