Rugged SFF Sentinel 26 GHz RF recorder challenges SWaP constraints
Joining the Pentek family of Talon signal recording and playback systems, the RTX 2684 26 GHz RF is the Sentinel intelligent signal scanning small form factor recorder.
The RTX 2684 combines the power of a Pentek Talon recording system with a 26 GHz RF tuner and Pentek’s Sentinel intelligent signal scanning software, packaged in a rugged, small form factor (SFF) 1/2 ATR chassis. Pentek’s SFF recorders provide the performance of large rackmount recorders in the smallest footprint available in Pentek’s Talon product line.
The Talon RTX 2684 SFF recorder weighs 23 pounds and is designed for extreme operating environments. Optimised for size, weight and power, the rugged sealed ½ ATR recorder is available with up to 61 TB of removable SSD storage. The ½ ATR chassis suits it to military, security and government intelligence applications that are mobile or space limited.
“The RTX 2684 Sentinel recorder is a complete antenna to disk solution with RF signals downconverted directly to the A/D converters,” said Rodger Hosking, vice-president of Pentek. “Its 5x reduction in packaging size over the rackmount equivalent, bandwidth performance, and storage capacity offer huge improvements in addressing challenging SWaP constraints in mobile or space limited platforms.”
A Pentek Model 78141A Jade transceiver module serves as the data acquisition engine of the Talon RTX 2684. One of its dual 3.2 GS/sec 12-bit A/D converters operates at a sample rate of 2.8 GS/sec.
The Model 78141 is coupled to the 500 MHz bandwidth analogue IF output signal of a 26 GHz RF tuner front end, delivering dynamic range across its spectrum.
A digital downconverter in the Model 78141 provides frequency zooming for recording signal bandwidths of 500, 250 or 125 MHz.
The RTX 2684 allows SIGINT engineers to scan the RF spectrum from 1 GHz to 26 GHz for signals of interest and monitor or record bandwidths up to 500 MHz wide. A spectral scan facility allows the user to scan the spectrum, while threshold detection allows the system to automatically lock onto and record signal bands.
Scan results are displayed in a waterfall plot and can also be recorded so users can look back at some earlier spectral activity. Once a signal of interest is detected, the real-time recorder can capture and store terabytes of data to disk, allowing users to store data spanning hours.
