Low-Cost Power Dividers

JFW manufactures both resistive type and reactive type power divider/combiners. Both types can be used to fan-in or fan-out RF signals. However, both types distribute RF signals in a different fashion. 

Resistive Power Divider/Combiners
The construction is a star configuration. All ports are symmetrical. There is no common port with this type design. A signal into port 1 will be divided up equally to ports 2, 3, 4, 5. This type of functionality makes resistive type power divider/combiners ideal for connecting multiple radios (Tx/Rx devices) together in a network. All radios connected to the resistive divider/ combiner have equal loss from radio-to-radio.

Reactive Power Divider/Combiners
The construction is non-symmetrical. A signal into the divider port (port 5) is divided up to all of the combiner ports (ports 1, 2, 3, 4). Signals into ports 1, 2, 3, 4 will all be combined together at port 5. The loss from divider port to a combiner port is equal for all paths. However, the loss between combiner ports is typically >20dB regardless of configuration (i.e. 1X2, 1X4, 1X8). The loss between combiner ports is referred to as isolation. The fact that the combiner ports are isolated from each other at >20dB typical makes reactive divider/combiners useful to fan-out a signal to multiple devices or fan-in signals from multiple devices.