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New for April 2026. The content on this topic was profvided by Vahe Adamian, a true friend of Microwaves101. Thank you!
Figure 1. Three generations of network analyzer calibration equipment
As shown in Figure 1, there are three generation of calibration artifacts for a Vector Network Analyzer (VNA) calibration. Generation 1 is how your grandmother calibrated teh reference planes of Hewlett Packard's venerable 8510 network analzer befor recoring data to 3.5 inche floppy discs. The ppen, short and load artifacts are manually connected to VNA ports one at a time for a VNA calibration. After VNA calibration the Device Under Test (DUT) is inserted for S-parameter characterization. An example of the cal kit is Keysight 85052D 3.5mm Calibration Kit. You can verify the accuracy of your calibration with the separately-sold 85053B 3.5mm HP Network Analyzer Verificatio, Kit
3.Manual Electronic (Gen2): The electronic calibration module is connected to VNA ports, and a plurality of electronic standards is generated to calibrate the VNA (Figure 2a). After VNA calibration the electronic calibration module is removed and DUT inserted for S-parameter characterization(Figure 2b). Example is the Keysight 3.5 mm Ecal
4.Automated Electronic (Gen3): An electronic calibration modules is inserted between port1 of the VNA and input of the DUT, a second electronic calibration module is inserted between output of the DUT and port2 of VNA. The electronic modules are Inline calibration (InCal) and they are not removed from the system. Refer to Figure 1& Figure 3. The VNA calibration is performed without the removal of DUT. Also, noise source and power sensor can be integrated into the Inline calibration modules, enabling noise and power characterizations of active devices as a function of source and load impedances. Example is the ATE Systems FCMs and SCMs