I would make a parabolic reflector like you, but have a secret compartment for an amplified repeater (booster) circuit and small battery. 😂 Don't tell the FCC! 🤐😇
@@isprithul Yeah, it's called The Inverse Square Law. It should give you 2x the distance with 4x the power (sqrt(4)=2), but in the real world there's all kinds of variables involved that will affect the distance. Edit: You can also search for a "decibel conversion table" to understand more about the dB to power (dbm) ratio. 😉👍
dB = relative measurement between two values (i.e voltage/power in vs voltage/power out) = 10log(P2/P1) = 20log(V2/V1) dBm = power expressed in logarithmic units = 10log(P/1mW)
I suggest not just doing it on dB vs dBm, but also on power db versus signal db (10log and 20log respectively). Since this doesn't just apply to RF power, but to all kinds of electronics and other domains.
i love that keysight is now hopefully posting regularly. You are a great, knowledgeable, funny and talented host. Keep it up! and also, gimme da metaaaaa! 🙈
just in case anyone cares.. a chamber with absorbers just on the walls and ceiling is a semi-anechoic chamber (typical for testing ground vehicles). An anechoic chamber has absorbers on the floor too, which is used for aircraft. I've worked in both industries, and spent too many hours in both types! The test gear is crazy expensive, but not as expensive as the chamber! The last chamber I worked in cost well over a million dollars (a 3 meter SAC).
After watching this video I was thinking that maybe comparing the imperial metal aluminum tin foil and the metric metal aluminium tin foil would give different results.
What page are the winners announced on? I signed up for the event but the link in the calendar entries just takes me to the kickoff video on UA-cam. I had to dig to find this video
Although I laugh with myself every time I do it, that fob to the head gives me almost always that extra couple meters my gluteus maximus needs to stay that way ;-)
What made the video was the 8-bit Yakety Sax. I remember going into a anechoic chamber at a Broadcom facility once, very cool! And yes I want a video on db vs dbm
A couple years ago a friend of mine doubted that the human head did have an amplification effect, ala being a resonant chamber or waveguide, even with my demonstration suggesting otherwise. One night, they forgot where they parked and tried it for themselves and begrudgingly texted me with confirmation.
One time some one told me that if you press more than 256time the carkey, with handshaking with the car, it will disable the carkey automatically! Did you test it?
Love it! Keysight Mythbusters! Seriously though Dan, I have used that first technique you tried in the chamber and against the face. Both helped slightly as your testing has confirmed. Yeah....an RF analyzer would be very handy tool to have if that's where you do most of your work. A must really. Good luck to everyone!
Are you planning to release a more affordable beginner network analyzer? Limited frequencies, bandwith. Same as you did with those new black instruments.
If you knew the frequency*, you could make a little Yagi with a space for the key-fob where the driven element would be. That ought to fairly easily get you more gain than anything shown so far. *It's about 434MHz in my country, but it's probably different in the US.
Hrmm, a few years ago I built a solar powered auto gate. We have Rf key fobs in our cars. Mine refuses to work during cold weather. The battery voltage is over 3v per cell (two cells in series) they are 3v cells. Anyway I'd love to see if the RF remote frequency is drifting when cold. Some of the other key fobs are ok so it's not the receiver. 🤔
I know this works in the field, but years ago I also tested this in the EMC Chamber at work and saw a little gain. I think every EE should spend some time working in a Compliance Lab, because you can learn so much about proper circuit design and grounding to prevent unwanted radiation from the unit, also immunity from external RF sources. You're able to use some really expensive test equipment as well. 😁
fascinating to see this idea put to test, though I wish it was further explained why putting the key fob by your head extends its range. I get it that it's not really in the field of electronics though...
What is the effect when properly grouding the reflectors and the tinfoil-hat? Because when I did calculations at uni, we found that at least a static electric field basicly passes right through a piece of metal. Our teacher also showed a demo where if the shielding around a cable was not grouded, it was basicly useless.
Conversely, what will reduce it's range? Fully wrapped in your hand with a bunch of other keys? Maybe. But what will kill it is if some other electronic device is broadcasting continuously on the same transmitter frequency. This actually happened in our parking lot when my next door neighbor got a security system that was jamming the 443.92 MHz that car alarms were using.
This would have been useful if I hadn't moved a few months ago. Never could get the gate opener to work decently at the old place, even with new batteries. Had to nose up to the gate real close and then back up before it hit me. Now the Keysight nerds tell me to put a parabolic reflector in the passenger seat.
If you try to calculate dbm gain from just the distance measurement at the end along with the inverse square law you get 4.01dbm gain for your parabolic reflector, not far off from the expected 6.35dbm! Maybe the environment impacts the range somehow. Or maybe the premise of calculating gain from distances is wrong lol. Awesome video as always!
Friend: Bruh, those guys have tin foil hats and gizmos. WTH??! Me: Ah, the keysight nerds are outside Inner voice: Can't wait to get to good wifi to see what awesome video they have uploaded
5:48 it's not about a mouth it's about a brain and more specific - water in your brain. Put a key near the top of your head and you should see a difference.
Wavelength guys and girls, wavelength! At 300MHz (ie ~1m) cups etc are too small to act as a good parabolic reflector. For the tinfoil hat you forgot the special curried egg paste 😁
The best and always "handy" way to increase the range of your key is to place the key close to your head, in the temple area and press the button! You don't believe it? Try it! It works!
Thanks guys that was funny i asking myself could it work like wlan booster like a yagi antenna i dont own a car so i dont know the frequency range i think yagi is something from 10 mhz up to 2000mhz
Your skin is conductive, it acts as a capacitor and extended antenna. I found this out when I was messing around with an FM transmitter a few years ago xD.
Basically you use Decibels to measure the difference between two signals. 10dB difference means a 10x increase in power. For Voltage or current 20dB is a 10x increase. So if you have a signal, that is 20dB bigger than another signal, it has 100 times the Power (2 * 10dB = 10 * 10 increase). So dB can only compare signals You get a dBm value, when comparing your signal strength to 1mW, so 0dBm = 1mW, 10dBm = 10mW, 20dBm = 100mW and so on.
@@marcdavis7583 Thank you for your reply. This song plays once in a lot of chances when I run a big and succesful build in my compiler software after 5PM. I've been scratching my head for a long time about why this sometimes happened but I found it (fortunately) is an easter egg... :-)
I'm quite surprised how you put the keys to your face. I think you will get better results if you just put the keys in front of open mouth. In the described case, a kind of resonance box will be created. I tested above scenario a few years ago with my old car and this idea improved the range. I am also struggling to understand why you tested different keys in the field? Sometimes it was 315 MHz and sometimes 434 MHz.
The total energy has to be the same. Redirecting the initial sphere into one conical volume could give you 9 times the density ( upward, downward, left and righrward, backward redirected frontward), or as if the LED was three times closer than it is (since it decays as 1 / r-square), which is NOT MUCH more, isn't it?
Haha, it is funny. I think the baseline measurements were a big factor in the results. A baseline in a low-power orientation vs. peak power would make a pretty big difference. Hard to rule out the spinning, though.
EDIT: +6 dB is 4x the power!
Sign up for Keysight University Live: bit.ly/KULive2
very narrow parabolic tube, because most LEDs I've seen are already have narrow beam width, or simply put it in the car instead of my pocket
I would make a parabolic reflector like you, but have a secret compartment for an amplified repeater (booster) circuit and small battery. 😂 Don't tell the FCC! 🤐😇
Is there any way to calculate how many times more range +6dB means?
@@isprithul Yeah, it's called The Inverse Square Law. It should give you 2x the distance with 4x the power (sqrt(4)=2), but in the real world there's all kinds of variables involved that will affect the distance.
Edit: You can also search for a "decibel conversion table" to understand more about the dB to power (dbm) ratio. 😉👍
hummmm tin foil hat. i guess Daniel learned that from Electroboom. Also video on db and dbm would be nice
dB = relative measurement between two values (i.e voltage/power in vs voltage/power out) = 10log(P2/P1) = 20log(V2/V1)
dBm = power expressed in logarithmic units = 10log(P/1mW)
The cup isn't Keysight, so that it didn't work. Let's do the experiment again :D
I would love a ton more introductory RF videos. I am liking what this channel has been up to last few weeks
I definitely want to do more RF stuff!
I suggest not just doing it on dB vs dBm, but also on power db versus signal db (10log and 20log respectively). Since this doesn't just apply to RF power, but to all kinds of electronics and other domains.
Isn't dB always power by convention?
This is hilarious and educational. I love it
"If my face works, what else could work?" Try keeping it in your pocket
i love that keysight is now hopefully posting regularly. You are a great, knowledgeable, funny and talented host. Keep it up!
and also, gimme da metaaaaa! 🙈
6:45 6dB is not double, but 4x the power. Surprisingly high extra gain
Good catch! I'm still not very good at that conversion in my head
What I want to know... Do you actually have that amazing view of mountains outside of your office? Wow!
Yep! Beautiful Colorado Springs
Y'all are great haha
Would like the dBm , dBd , dBi topics covered as well =]
a fresh video on dB vs dBm would be so great! it's a great possibility for newcomers and a welcome refresher for the pro's @Keysight Labs
just in case anyone cares.. a chamber with absorbers just on the walls and ceiling is a semi-anechoic chamber (typical for testing ground vehicles). An anechoic chamber has absorbers on the floor too, which is used for aircraft. I've worked in both industries, and spent too many hours in both types! The test gear is crazy expensive, but not as expensive as the chamber! The last chamber I worked in cost well over a million dollars (a 3 meter SAC).
Would love a video on dB and dBm. My teacher could never explain it nicely.
After watching this video I was thinking that maybe comparing the imperial metal aluminum tin foil and the metric metal aluminium tin foil would give different results.
What page are the winners announced on? I signed up for the event but the link in the calendar entries just takes me to the kickoff video on UA-cam. I had to dig to find this video
Although I laugh with myself every time I do it, that fob to the head gives me almost always that extra couple meters my gluteus maximus needs to stay that way ;-)
What made the video was the 8-bit Yakety Sax. I remember going into a anechoic chamber at a Broadcom facility once, very cool! And yes I want a video on db vs dbm
I have held my key fob to my bare, un-tinfoiled head, and seemed to get a significant boost in range. 🤖🤖🤖
A couple years ago a friend of mine doubted that the human head did have an amplification effect, ala being a resonant chamber or waveguide, even with my demonstration suggesting otherwise. One night, they forgot where they parked and tried it for themselves and begrudgingly texted me with confirmation.
One time some one told me that if you press more than 256time the carkey, with handshaking with the car, it will disable the carkey automatically! Did you test it?
Love it! Keysight Mythbusters! Seriously though Dan, I have used that first technique you tried in the chamber and against the face. Both helped slightly as your testing has confirmed. Yeah....an RF analyzer would be very handy tool to have if that's where you do most of your work. A must really. Good luck to everyone!
Are you planning to release a more affordable beginner network analyzer? Limited frequencies, bandwith. Same as you did with those new black instruments.
If you knew the frequency*, you could make a little Yagi with a space for the key-fob where the driven element would be. That ought to fairly easily get you more gain than anything shown so far. *It's about 434MHz in my country, but it's probably different in the US.
I love keysight channel, It really gives learning content and fun content! Keep it up boys, Love ya!
Is totally true. I never heard about that. But discover it by my self. And been using that trick
This is like a mini episode of Mythbusters!
Those are some gosh darn beautiful mountains behind your campus. Where is that at (Colorado?)
Yep! Colorado Springs
That Feeld Fox would go great in my equipment arsenal! 😁🤩🤘
Hey Daniel, it would be really nice to have a video of dB vs dBm.
How about working on the circuit to make it higher power?
How about putting a small reflector behind the antenna on the key itself?
Good ideas! It would be interesting to make a directional key
Hrmm, a few years ago I built a solar powered auto gate. We have Rf key fobs in our cars. Mine refuses to work during cold weather. The battery voltage is over 3v per cell (two cells in series) they are 3v cells. Anyway I'd love to see if the RF remote frequency is drifting when cold. Some of the other key fobs are ok so it's not the receiver. 🤔
5:40 yes please video on dbm vs db!
I know this works in the field, but years ago I also tested this in the EMC Chamber at work and saw a little gain. I think every EE should spend some time working in a Compliance Lab, because you can learn so much about proper circuit design and grounding to prevent unwanted radiation from the unit, also immunity from external RF sources. You're able to use some really expensive test equipment as well. 😁
That Keysight jacket is SMOKIN COOL
Thats amazing ma dawg!
yes do a video on dB & dBm!!!
Would love a video on dBm dBi and dB in general
fascinating to see this idea put to test, though I wish it was further explained why putting the key fob by your head extends its range. I get it that it's not really in the field of electronics though...
Yes, make a video on dB vs. dBm so I can show it to my students. I’m sure you’ll explain it more interestingly than I can.
Working on it now!
What is the effect when properly grouding the reflectors and the tinfoil-hat? Because when I did calculations at uni, we found that at least a static electric field basicly passes right through a piece of metal. Our teacher also showed a demo where if the shielding around a cable was not grouded, it was basicly useless.
Interesting! Worth checking out for sure
5:37 We want a video on "that topic"🙋♂️
Can someone send me the link to the winner's list of the following event
you're not on it.
Conversely, what will reduce it's range? Fully wrapped in your hand with a bunch of other keys? Maybe. But what will kill it is if some other electronic device is broadcasting continuously on the same transmitter frequency. This actually happened in our parking lot when my next door neighbor got a security system that was jamming the 443.92 MHz that car alarms were using.
A Faraday cage?
so the marketing team could know make coffee mug that actually improved the range of key fob and hold your favorite beverage. That would be funny.
Ah yes! Increase it all you can so my code capturing receiver can pick it up! Bye bye your car!
Rolling codes ftw
pls more videos about, antennas, signals, messurement and understandung about this
They call it a field fox because it sniffs out where the fault is and jumps right on it. It's also rugged so it survives the landing.
What's the radiation pattern of the keyfob?
Product idea: Car key range increasing umbrella. Also screens the user from the dreaded 5G.
It's weird...with my garage remote, this actually works, and improves the signal a lot. But with my car key(BMW), doesn't do a thing...
So, the face with tinfoil hat means, your reflected signal is thru your head !
Please make a video about dBm
I'd like a video on dB vs dBm, sounds like a good idea
Why did you release a video about this. I wanted to make this exact topic my PhD thesis
"who would buy a pill that makes you blind?" "We'll let marketing worry about that" -- The Simpsons.
This would have been useful if I hadn't moved a few months ago.
Never could get the gate opener to work decently at the old place, even with new batteries. Had to nose up to the gate real close and then back up before it hit me.
Now the Keysight nerds tell me to put a parabolic reflector in the passenger seat.
I would love to see more abouth that Anechoic chamber
If you try to calculate dbm gain from just the distance measurement at the end along with the inverse square law you get 4.01dbm gain for your parabolic reflector, not far off from the expected 6.35dbm! Maybe the environment impacts the range somehow. Or maybe the premise of calculating gain from distances is wrong lol. Awesome video as always!
Gain is in dB. The actual power is in dBm or dBμ.
So you can find the dB or dbm of something that transmitte something. Is that the basic principle of it
It's like sound volume is talked about in dB, it's basically a log scale measurement that's useful for dealing with RF
thank you
Daniel, are you wearing your headphones backwards?
Probably. Mono FTW
Friend: Bruh, those guys have tin foil hats and gizmos. WTH??!
Me: Ah, the keysight nerds are outside
Inner voice: Can't wait to get to good wifi to see what awesome video they have uploaded
Can we appreciate that Daniel's glasses look like they're made of licorice?
5:48 it's not about a mouth it's about a brain and more specific - water in your brain. Put a key near the top of your head and you should see a difference.
Charge your fieldfox, jeeeeezuss 😂
Haha no kidding. We had to run a really long extension cord a while into filming. I told Sarah she needs another battery!
Where's the link to the Sarah Gross video on the FieldFox?
Somehow I stumbled on the link to the live show yesterday, but I don't know where that was.
you can find it on the 16-Mar page: bit.ly/KULive2
Wavelength guys and girls, wavelength! At 300MHz (ie ~1m) cups etc are too small to act as a good parabolic reflector.
For the tinfoil hat you forgot the special curried egg paste 😁
We are antennas and actually I think somehow it can work but not in the way it's useful for un.
The best and always "handy" way to increase the range of your key is to place the key close to your head, in the temple area and press the button! You don't believe it? Try it! It works!
Thanks guys that was funny i asking myself could it work like wlan booster like a yagi antenna i dont own a car so i dont know the frequency range i think yagi is something from 10 mhz up to 2000mhz
Shouldn't 6dB (ua-cam.com/video/AjYyjQKW-pU/v-deo.html) be four times as much power?
Yup! Still not great at dB math in my head
This one was even more interesting video than the last one, I was rooting for the trigonometry guy
Isn't the easiest way to increase the signal strength of the key to decrease the distance?
Nevermind, as I was typing this I got to 3:24
Great minds think alike :)
Hm. If this is what keysight staff does, seems like fun place to work.
But for measurement I'll stick with R&S 😀
oooof
Your skin is conductive, it acts as a capacitor and extended antenna.
I found this out when I was messing around with an FM transmitter a few years ago xD.
The Benny Hill music is appropriate!
Amazing ⚡
I've never understood perfectly the Decibel and I don't know what DBm is... a video about it would be very good :)
@UCqrx9X729xC86Jj3QMo1ghA yes but whatching a funny video it's not the same thing as browsing da wiki
Decibel is a measure of sound pressure, it is logarithmic. DBm.. that I'm curious about as well.
What the heck is going on with youtube ?
@@TedSchoenling thanks but it's oversimplified :(
Basically you use Decibels to measure the difference between two signals. 10dB difference means a 10x increase in power. For Voltage or current 20dB is a 10x increase. So if you have a signal, that is 20dB bigger than another signal, it has 100 times the Power (2 * 10dB = 10 * 10 increase). So dB can only compare signals
You get a dBm value, when comparing your signal strength to 1mW, so 0dBm = 1mW, 10dBm = 10mW, 20dBm = 100mW and so on.
Your anechoic chamber has cooler lighting than ours
Haha we definitely don't have that there normally, but we had to make it pretty
1:33 does anyone know the name of that song?
Yakety Sax. It was used in Benny Hill chase sequences.
ua-cam.com/video/ZnHmskwqCCQ/v-deo.html
@@marcdavis7583 Thank you for your reply. This song plays once in a lot of chances when I run a big and succesful build in my compiler software after 5PM. I've been scratching my head for a long time about why this sometimes happened but I found it (fortunately) is an easter egg... :-)
Yes, I want a video about dBm
The tin foil man would amplify the signal. There, I said it.
I'm quite surprised how you put the keys to your face. I think you will get better results if you just put the keys in front of open mouth. In the described case, a kind of resonance box will be created. I tested above scenario a few years ago with my old car and this idea improved the range. I am also struggling to understand why you tested different keys in the field? Sometimes it was 315 MHz and sometimes 434 MHz.
If reflectors boost signals. Then I would use huge lens and a led to light my area.
The total energy has to be the same. Redirecting the initial sphere into one conical volume could give you 9 times the density ( upward, downward, left and righrward, backward redirected frontward), or as if the LED was three times closer than it is (since it decays as 1 / r-square), which is NOT MUCH more, isn't it?
@@snnwstt just for fun bro..
Wait, Ally got second place? Was it the spinning and jumping? I need answers!
Haha, it is funny. I think the baseline measurements were a big factor in the results. A baseline in a low-power orientation vs. peak power would make a pretty big difference. Hard to rule out the spinning, though.
I knew I wasn't crazy! 🤪
Well you could still be crazy, just for different reasons.
Isn't 6dB 4 times the power while 3dB is 2 times the power? All of your solutions were at least almost doubling the power.
Yep! I'm still bad at dB conversion math in my head
Ok....my employment application is now on its way. Hire me!
Should have charged that battery :-P
Nerds behaving... well... nerdy.. love it.
Isn't 6 dB 4x power not 2x power?
Yes :'( I'm not so great at the RF/dB conversion math in my head, apparently.
Loving the benny hill theme song!
Top Gear proved this years ago... & I tried it & it works... 😏
Ooooo 1st one!!!!
BTW My luck is too bad ,haven't got anything, i am Following you all from 3 years . Really need those!
Sixty Symbols showed that a jug of water also works :)
Where do we get the cat shirt?
Do a video on dbm
I think your reflector didn't work because the foil's surface was not smooth
"... It wasn't better"
I could feel you hurt inside. Had to cut it out of the video and all.
Haha yes, it was a whole thing!
@@KeysightLabs We won't judge if you make 2nd channel, "Keysight Labs - Director's Cut" where we can see the fruits of your labour ;D