This measurement has been done on Dec 1st, 2015.

The phase noise added by the EOM driver was tested.

The test setup is depicted in the attached PDF. The phase of the RF detector was set so that the output is close to zero crossing as much as possible with the precision of 0.5ns using a switchable delay line box. The phase to voltage conversion was checked by changing the delayline by 1ns. This gave me somewhat larger conversion factor compared to the sine wave test using an independent signal generator. This was due to the saturation of the phase detector as the LO and RF both have similar high RF level for the frequency mixer used.

The measurement has done with 1) no EOM driver involved, 2) one EOM driver inserted in the RF path, and 3) EOM drivers inserted in both the LO and RF paths.

I could not understand why the measurement limit is so high. Also the case 2 seems too low comsidering the noise level for 1) and 3).

At least we could see clear increase of the noise between the case 1) and 3). Therefore, we can infer the phase noise added by the EOM driver from the measurements.

Note: The additional phase noise could be associated with the original amplitude noise of the oscillator and the amplitude-to-phase conversion by the variable attenuator. This means that the noise could be corellated between two EOM drivers. The true test could be done using a PLL with a quiet VCO. Unfortuantely I don't have a good oscillator sufficient for this measurement.