Rohde and Schwarz has developed an innovative multichannel receiver optimized for software defined radio applications in satellite communications and monitoring. The R&S MSR4 receives signals in the L band between 500 MHz and 3 GHz on four tunable channels and provides an on-board recording function. In addition, the receiver's two transmit channels can use data from internal storage and external sources to generate RF signals from 900 MHz to 2.5 GHz. The small form factor allows smooth integration in various scenarios. The R&S MSR4 comes with a web based graphical user interface, which simplifies operation.
The R&S®MSR4 is ideal for a wide range of applications thanks to its adaptable integrated system-on-chip (SoC) radio platform. In the future, the receiver will be expanded for even more applications.
Key Features of the R&S MSR4 Software-Defined Satellite Receiver
I/Q streamer/record and replay
A basic function of the R&S MSR4 is simultaneous broad-band streaming from its four receive lines, each with 200 MHz bandwidth, using four 10 Gbit interfaces. A 100 Gbit interface is also included for future use. The integrated 1 Tbyte SSD storage enables I/Q data to be recorded and replayed without any additional hardware.
Carrier defragmentation/polyphase filter
A selection of interesting carriers from four receive channels, each with 200 MHz bandwidth, can be queued into one transmit channel with a smaller optimized bandwidth for the next signal processing stage.
Monitoring spectrum and carriers
In combination with the R&S GSACSM software suite, the R&S MSR4 is the perfect hardware platform for spectrum monitoring, carrier monitoring and classification of sitcom signals for up to four channels. In a scalable client/server architecture, R&S GSACSM allows remote spectrum analysis with systems located anywhere worldwide.
Antenna combiner (four to one)
The R&S MSR4 can act as an antenna combiner, receiving signals from up to four smaller antennas and combining them into one signal with an improved SNR. The SATCOM signal quality is comparable with signals received from much larger antenna systems (available in the future).
Carrier-in-carrier separation
Carrier-in-carrier (CiC) technology is commonly used in SATCOM for e.g. VSAT and SCPC to save valuable bandwidth. Separating them again with no prior knowledge of the combined signals is challenging, but the R&S MSR4 can perform CiC separation in real time (available in 2022). This function is also useful for interference hunting applications.
Key Parameters
- Four receive channels, tunable from 0.5 GHz to 3 GHz
- Two transmit channels, tunable from 0.9 GHz to 2.5 GHz
- 200 MHz bandwidth for receive and transmit channels up to 200 MHz wide I/Q streaming from each receive channel
- Dedicated 10 Gbit interfaces for each receive channel and a 100 Gbit interface for future use
- Integrated 1 Tbyte SSD for signal recording and replay over one of the transmit channels
- GNSS and external system synchronization
- Easy to operate via WebUI or via an application programming interface (API)
- Trigger input and output event control (available soon)
- GNU radio support (will be available soon)
- Compact and ideal as a standalone solution or integrated into system solutions – a 1 RU, 19" wide device that weighs only 7 kg.
Click here to learn more about the multipurpose channel receiver from Rohde and Schwarz.
Click here to view other Channel Receivers (includes Transmitters) using SDRs on everything RF.
