The Qubit Control RF Module (QCM-RF) is a 2-channel direct-RF qubit control module for pulse generation within the 2 - 18.5 GHz frequency range. This module features six Q1 sequence processors and a high-end analog front-end with integrated upconversion, establishing the QCM-RF as an advanced solution for microwave control of qubits with high SFDR, ultralow noise, and great phase stability. With 2 analog and 2 digital outputs, the QCM-RF has the highest channel density on the market for the microwave regime, enabling up to 40 output channels in a single Cluster 19-inch mainframe. The SYNQ protocol assures synchronized start of all channels below 1 ns accuracy with picosecond jitter, while the LINQ protocol facilitates the generation of control pulses within ∼ 350 ns in response to triggers from readout modules.

The QCM-RF’s fully integrated architecture incorporates 6 Q1 processor cores to generate high-precision pulses in real-time by using waveforms from 16k wave memory and shaping the outputs by amplitude, offset, modulation frequency, and phase. I and Q pulses are defined in a 1 ns time grid, and their parameters can be updated on the nanosecond scale. The pulses are upconverted to the RF domain via the integrated local oscillator and IQ mixers with ultra-low noise and high stability for microwave control of qubits. Orders of magnitude speed-ups are achieved by avoiding software-controlled loops, repeated wave uploading, and external up-conversion stages.