Welcome to the eTraining understanding the “Fundamentals of Monitoring Receivers “.

1
2
The most essential properties of a monitoring receiver can be derived from this video. A
monitoring receiver is used for
- Monitoring of wideband spectra … with
- fast scan speed … by providing a high
- Dynamic Range. All signals captured can be analyzed using a
- Time-Frequency Display without any loss of information.

In this chapter, you will learn why exactly these properties are so important and for what
applications they are necessary for.

3
The main objective of Chapter One is to understand what monitoring receivers are used for. In
addition, the main applications and customers are shown.

As you can imagine, all parts of a monitoring receiver are optimized for it’s specific tasks and
applications. To understand the architecture of monitoring receivers more in detail, the second
Chapter explains the main building blocks of monitoring receivers.

4
After completing this chapter you can explain what is causing the increased demand for
monitoring receivers.

Following this, you can name the main applications that require monitoring receivers.
To meet the requirements of these applications, monitoring receivers must have certain properties
and features. Accordingly, you will be able to list important properties of monitoring receivers.

6
In our modern world, everybody and everything is connected with each other. The use of mobile
phones and mobile data services has become our everyday life. Furthermore, governmental and
non-governmental authorities as well as the military have an increased demand for communication
and distribution of information.

Almost every year, new communication standards or services are introduced. But every time, one
fact has to be considered: We all use one common resource – the wireless spectrum.

Depending on the application, the devices and standards become more complex.
We do have an evolution of mobile networks: Bandwidths, frequencies and data rates increase
significantly from generation to generation. We also have an evolution of communication
standards: MIMO transmissions, digital modulation and frequency diversity schemes are adapted
and introduced. Just recently we could observe the evolution in broadcast: Digital Modulation
became state-of-the-art

All of this leads to one conclusion:

 The spectrum must be properly maintained and controlled in order to keep everything running
without problems

7
Comparing the spectrum 10 years ago with our spectrum nowadays, there are several differences.
In former times, the number of transmissions and communication devices was significant lower
then today. This means, the spectrum was less dense and hence easier to observe.

Nowadays, The number of transmissions increases yearly due to the increased demand of
communication. Furthermore, new digital standards increase the power per Hertz and hence the
total signal power in the spectrum.
Especially in urban areas, the spectrum becomes very dense and of high power.

… but what are the challenges when managing such a dense and complex spectrum? Which
problems can occur?

8
Due to the increased variety of transmitters, faulty devices become more likely. Furthermore, the
rollout of new standards and infrastructure always causes failures and problems.

Nevertheless, not only licensed transmissions can cause disturbing signals, which we call
interferences. Also, equipment from foreign countries has a high chance of producing unwanted
emissions due to different regulations applied. Another problem are market available transmitters
like repeaters, amplifiers, jammers etc. which may be abused and cause interference in the
spectrum.

For all these reasons and more, sources of interference are versatile and can be found
everywhere.

Interference in past times could be detected and investigated easier due to the reduced number of
transmissions in the spectrum.

Considering the increased number of faulty devices nowadays and the increased number of
transmissions, interference hunting becomes very challenging. The interference may be within
another transmission or hard to detect between strong power carriers.

This challenge leads us to one of the main application of radiomonitoring receivers.

9
This is your first exercise. Please mark the correct answer to the following question: What causes
the increased demand for monitoring receivers?

10
As the name “monitoring receiver” implies, one of the main applications of these high performance
receivers is to monitor the radio spectrum.

In general, the main tasks of monitoring receivers in this application are:

Scanning the spectrum. During scans, the monitoring system investigates the spectrum for
unknown transmissions.

Furthermore, reported interferences have to be found, investigated and documented.

Another task is the measurement and verification of licensed transmissions. Broadcasting stations
are licensed with certain conditions, for example center frequency, bandwidth, transmission power
and other modulation parameters. The broadcasting stations have to follow these conditions and
hence the regulatory authorities verify this on a regular basis.

As already mentioned, the customers in this application are regulatory authorities.

11
Further Applications of radiomonitoring receivers are within the tasks of Public safety agencies
and authorities with security tasks. On contrary to regulatory authorities, these customers have a
designated frequency range they are responsible for.
One of the most common examples is the Monitoring of the Air-Traffic-Control Band.

The challenge for these customers are, that due to cheap and market available transmission and
communication devices, critical infrastructure can be interfered easily.

Planes are directed by the ATC headquarter on ground and in the airspace. As you can imagine,
this communication is highly critical and must be kept safe by all means. Illegal GPS jammers or
faulty devices can cause big troubles in air traffic. If any interference is detected, very short
reaction times are necessary.

Furthermore, monitoring receivers may be used to ensure and validate the correct functioning of
ATC channels by means of the spectral shape or listening to the transmission themselves.

As already mentioned, Air Traffic Control Departments are customer in this application.

12
Another very important application of radiomonitoring receivers is border control and surveillance.
When observing the spectrum, unusual transmissions or communication can be revealed.

These transmissions may indicate illegal boarder crossings, smugglers or other illegal ware
exchanges. Typical communication devices at borders are mobile phones or commercial push-to-
talk handhelds. The latter may use analoge AM or FM modulation, which can be demodulated by
the receiver directly and thus permit fast response time of the border control units.

Depending on the structures within the country of interest, the customers are the authorities in
charge for border control.

Security agencies and other authorities also have frequency bands they need to be free of
interference constantly. Furthermore, illegal transmissions may interfere with security tasks
heavily.
So their main interest is the monitoring and clearance of special frequency ranges within their
responsibility. One common application is bug-finding in classified meeting rooms and facilities.

The customers for this application are for example security authorities and organizations with
access to classified information

Summarized, the main Tasks in security-based applications are:

Detect and analyze unknown transmissions and interferences; enforce shutdown of interferences
and hold the responsible person accountable for illegal actions

13
Looking at the military, the electromagnetic spectrum is one dimension of warfare. Having a
precise overview of the spectrum supports many tasks faced by the military units. The general
term for these applications is Signals Intelligence or SIGINT in short. SIGINT has two main sub-
categories which are communications intelligence (COMINT) and eleconic intelligence (ELINT).

In the last years, many convoys have been targets of remote controlled improvised electronic
devices which are remotely detonated using commercial radio transmitters. Detecting such
transmission schemes to avoid the detonation is a vital task of convoys.
Furthermore, military units have a great interest on communication activities in the target area of
interest. This may be the front, behind enemy lines or even within the friendly controlled area.
Detecting and investigating single transmissions as well as transmission schemes may indicate
enemy actions planned. If the targets use modulations like AM or FM, the radiomonitoring receiver
can even be used to listen-in transmission live.
All these actions are summarized by the term Communication Intelligence, or in short COMINT.
COMINT and spectrum monitoring are currently the main applications monitoring receivers are
focusing on.

Besides the communication intelligence, there is also electronic intelligence that relies on
radiomonitoring receiver technology.
ELINT focuses on the interception and analysis of radar signals in order to analyze the equipment
fielded by the enemy.
This information provides a strategic advantage and may be used for counter-electronic
equipment and systems.

In summary, a variety of departments within the armed forces and the ministry of defense have
great interest in monitoring receivers. Receivers are one building block used to accomplish
strategic and tactical superiority of the electromagnetic spectrum.

14
Besides the applications already explained, there are several more to mention.
In general, many devices and systems require high performance reception quality.
This means, that understanding monitoring receivers will benefit your competence for the whole
portfolio of our division.

Main examples for monitoring receiver based products and systems are
- Direction Finders, which are used for geolocation of radio signals.
- Spectrum Recording Solutions, which provide sophisticated storage and data management
capabilities to record a high amount of data for hours and days.
- Signal analysis systems, which are used to analyze transmissions either online or offline. This
can be done by a technical analysis of the transmission or by an in-depth analysis of the content
itself. Such systems are used in our CUAV-Solution, for example .

Our Reconnaissance systems also rely on a high quality received signals to perform their specific
tasks properly. A in-depth analysis of communication is only possible, if the analyzed data has
sufficient SNR. This is accomplished by monitoring receivers.

As you can see, radiomonitoring receivers are main building blocks of many other products and
systems. This means, that understanding receivers not only benefits your understanding of the
receivers itself, but also improves your expertise with many other products and systems

15
This exercise is a multiple choice test. Please mark all the answers that describe typical
applications of monitoring receivers.

16
Having all these applications in mind, a modern radiomonitoring receiver must fulfill a variety of tasks.
However, all these applications share common properties and requirements for receivers which can be
summarized as follows:

Monitoring Receivers are operated at a wideband antenna. This means that many 100 Megahertz to several
gigahertz will be received by the receiver at the same time.
During the operation at a wideband antenna, the receiver must be able to handle very strong signals, like
broadcasting signals, while maintaining a high sensitivity to receive weak signals like interferences.
Since the spectrum of interest can be of very wide bandwidth, the radiomonitoring receiver must be able to
perform very fast scans. This ensures fast response times in case of unwanted and short time signals.

Depending on the application, the received RF spectrum is analyzed in various ways. Regulatory authorities
will perform ITU-conform measurements on broadcasting signals, while COMINT customers may analyze
the time-frequency behavior of unknown transmissions to identify their origin.
Also, live listening helps many customers to identify and validate the source of transmissions.

Alongside these main properties of receivers, there can be many more requirements. Also, depending on the
application, operation scenario and the tasks faced, receivers may require other features that are special to
certain applications. Most monitoring receivers are multi-purpose devices that cover several applications by
options. The multitude of features and their benefits must be understood well and fitted to the applications of
our customers.

17
Let us summarize the content of the first chapter.

Due to the advancing connectivity of our world, the spectrum becomes more complex everyday.
This situation leads us directly to one of the prime applications of monitoring receivers.
The spectrum monitoring of regulatory authorities. These authorities are in charge to maintain the
proper operation of the licensed and unlicensed spectrum. Furthermore, other authorities with
security tasks like Air-Traffic-Control Centers have great interest specific frequency ranges they
have to maintain.

Another prime application of monitoring receivers is Signals intelligence for armed forces. SIGINT
tasks are subdivided in Communications Intelligence and Eleconics Intelligence. In COMINT
applications, the focus lies on communication signals of target groups. In ELINT, the equipment
fielded by the opposing forces is investigated.

To fulfill these tasks, monitoring receivers are optimized for the following properties:
Signal reception using several wideband antennas
high scan speed to cover wide frequency ranges
and demodulation of signals for live-listening.

18
Hello everyone and welcome to the second part of our eTraining. In this course we will cover the
main building blocks of a receiver and their functions.

19
In this Chapter, we will name and explain the main building blocks of monitoring receivers. During
this,
the purpose of each building block will be highlighted. To illustrate the practical influence of each
building block, we will explain the signal flow within the receiver using different examples.

20
We will introduce this chapter with the historical origin of receivers.

Receivers are built for listening to transmissions in the air.

Therefore, the receiver is connected to an antenna receiving the frequency band of interest.
Using this antenna, the receiver will receive a variety of transmissions within the entire frequency
range of the antenna

In order to select the transmission we are interested in, the receiver needs filters that suppress
unwanted transmissions and pass the transmission we are looking for to the following stages
This is what we call Selectivity: Filters in the receiver that suppress unwanted “out of band” signals
and pass the signal of interest to the demodulation.
Our signal of interest may be weak compared to the other signals we have received before.
Therefore receivers require a certain sensitivity that allows the device to receive weak signals.
Sensitivity is a very important feature of any receiver.
Finally, we want to listen to the transmission. Therefor the modulated signal has to be
demodulated using the appropriate demodulator.

21
As a result, we can now listen to our transmission of interest

Starting with this simple design, we will advance in time and cover the building blocks of a modern
radiomonitoring receiver. In addition to the basic “communications receiver” we just described, a
monitoring receiver is a multi-purpose device featuring a variety of functions like fast wideband
scanning and complex processing of the input spectrum.

22
As already mentioned, a receiver is used to receive signals from an antenna and demodulate the
audio.
Monitoring receiver do basically the same.

23
In order to understand how these two properties are achieved, we use this block diagram of
monitoring receivers.

Nowadays monitoring receivers are very complex devices with many stages for signal adjustment
and processing. It is no longer possible to identify dedicated blocks for only selectivity and
sensitivity. Nevertheless, we will find optimization for exactly these properties at many stages
later.

Depending on the class and type of the receiver, the following blocks may be part of the device or
not. Furthermore, each individual building block may be highly complex or fairly simple. In this
eTraining you will gain an overview about the most common designs, so that you are able to
understand the general multi purpose monitoring receiver.

The following blocks are the main stages in monitoring receivers:

• An antenna matrix for the selection of the proper antenna
• Preselection to reduce the signal load
• Gain control for level adjustment
• Frequency conversion stages to cover a wide frequency input
• An analog-to-digital converter to digitize the signal
• …and digital signal processing

On the following slides we will discuss each building block individually to better understand their
specific tasks.

24
The first block is the antenna matrix.
The antenna matrix selects the antenna input according to user defined settings.

25
26
Monitoring receivers offer the advantage, that several different antennas can be connected in
parallel. With each antenna covering a certain frequency range, the whole spectrum of interest
can be monitored seamless using only the monitoring receiver and without the need for external
switches.

The antenna selection depends mainly on the frequency and polarization of interest. By switching
the antenna input, internal paths in the subsequent stages are adjusted automatically.

When implementing an internal antenna switch, fully automatic switching and fast scanning times
are ensured. If external switches would be used instead, several challenges could occur. For
example latency due to communication times, hard- and software compatibility and size
constraints for integration.

27
The next block is the preselection. Preselection reduces the total signal load for the subsequent
stages by filtering frequency ranges that are not of interest. Since antennas are typically very
wideband, the total signal load may overdrive active components. Therefore, the preselection uses
a set of filter banks to filter a certain passbands out of the total spectrum.

Different combinations of filters may be used for this task. In general, there are two categories of
filters. Fixed frequency filters and tunable filters.

28
In the lower frequency range, fixed frequency lowpasses may be used.

29
For intermediate and high frequencies, fixed frequency bandpasses, which are mostly
implemented as lowpass/highpass combinations, are used.

30
Additionaly, fixed frequency filters may be supplemented or subsituted by tunable filters. Tunable
filters provide the advantage, that only one filter is necessary to cover very broad bandwidths.
Disadvantages are, amongst others, the relatively fixed bandwidth and the significant amplitude
ripple in the passband.

31
Preselection is one of the most important and unique feature of monitoring receivers. Only with a
sophisticated and complex preselection, measurements using a wideband antenna are possible.
Furthermore, the spectrum load increases significantly, if high gain directional antennas are used.
The key performance parameter improved with preselection is linearity.

Professional receivers implement their preselection as a “tracking preselection”. This means, that
the preselection switches very fast between the individual filter banks and hence ensures very
short switching times while performing wideband scans.

32
The next stage is gain control.

Gain control is necessary, to either attenuate strong signals or amplify weak signals.
For this purpose, gain control consists of complex distributed stages of amplifiers and attenuators.
Typically, gain control are rather distributed circuits in various blocks of the monitoring receiver
then a separate block itself. Still, the purpose of this building block is to highlight the importance of
a proper gain control for monitoring receivers.

As already mentioned, there are two main adjustments on the input signal possible. The signal
can either be amplified or attenuated.

33
Amplification of a weak input signal improves the sensitivity of the receiver. This is typically done
by activating amplifiers located directly after the antenna matrix in order to improve the noise
figure of the receiver.

34
Contrary to amplification, attenuation of strong input signals improves the linearity of the receiver.
Attenuation reduces the input power of subsequent circuits. Thus saturation effects are avoided or
at least decreased.

In order to preset the analog frontend to certain receiving conditions, the receiver can be set to
different receiving modes. Typically, the following modes exist:
Low noise mode, low distortion mode and normal mode.

We will cover the specific properties of these modes in the next chapter. For now, these modes
enable and disable amplification and attenuation combinations. By doing this, the monitoring
receiver is optimized in terms of linearity or sensitivity.

35
Another important function of the gain control is based on the origin of receivers.
As you already know, one of the main functions of receivers is the live listening. So many parts of
the receiver are optimized exactly for this purpose.

There are mainly two challenges when listening to audio signals. At first, the signal amplitude may
vary over time significantly. This happens due to a changing environment and multipath effects
between transmitter and receiver. Secondly, amplitude modulation, especially the single sideband
variants, varies in power by principle.

On the left side, a changing signal power over time is depicted. This corresponds to a varying
volume when listening to the signal.

36
With the AGC activated, a complex feedback loop “stabilizes” the audio volume while listening.
Only this way demodulated audio signals are pleasantly audible. This is why an automatic gain
control (AGC) is absolutely necessary for every receiver.

Another type of gain control is the manual gain control. The MGC is mainly used when the AGC
does not respond properly. Using the MGC, manual adjustments on the input signal are possinle.

It is important to note that the realization of the AGC has changed within the last years. Depending
on the type of monitoring receiver, the AGC and MGC may be implemented purely digital or as a
complex mixture of analog and digital signal processing.

37
The next building block is frequency conversion.

Frequency conversion is necessary to convert the input signal frequency band to the ADC
frequency band.

The conversion is typically done by using one, two or more intermediate frequency stages. The
number of stages depends on many factors like input frequency and receiver design.
Before converting the center frequency of the input signal, the signal is filtered by IF filters.
In general, IF stages are complex stages of filters and mixers. The first IF stage always uses a
tunable LO that has to be synthesize according to the frequency band of interest.
Having the variable oscillator in the first IF stage, subsequent stages are typically optimized for a
fixed frequency.

HF frequencies, however, are typically not converted at all. This is because the ADC operates in
this frequency range itself. This method is called direct sampling.

38
This exercise is called Hot Spot. Please click on the building block that performs the following
task:

The searched building block filters the input spectrum using lowpass, bandpass or highpass filters.
As a consequence, only a certain frequency range of interest is passed to the subsequent stages.

39
So summarize the functionalities of the individual building blocks, a simplified signal flow of an
input signal is depicted. The starting point is right behind the antenna matrix. To memorize: The
purpose of the antenna matrix is to select the proper antenna input according to our frequency of
interest. In this example, the signal of interest is highlighted in grey.

Following the antenna matrix, the preselection is used to filter our frequency band of interest out of
the total received spectrum. Filtering is done by using either lowpass, bandpass or highpass
filters.

40
The output of the preselection is a filtered version of the input spectrum with reduces signal load.

41
Next, the gain control may attenuate or amplify the passband of the preselection, including our
signal of interest.

In this example, the input signal is of high power and thus needs to be attenuated.

42
Now, the amplitude adjusted signal is converted to the ADC frequency range.
While passing the IF stages, IF filters suppressed signals that passed the preselection, but are not
of interest. To accomplish this, the IF bandwidth is adjusted such that it matches the signal
bandwidth.

After passing all IF stages, only the signal of interest has passed all filters. Furthermore, the last IF
stage has the same frequency as the ADC. At this point, the input signal passed all analog stages
of the monitor receiver. Finally, the signal of interest has been ideally prepared to be fed to the
analog to digital converter.

43
In this exercise, Drag & Drop the building blocks of monitoring receivers into their correct order.

44
The last building block of the analog frontend and the first building block of the digital signal
processing is the analog to digital converter.

Simply said, the purpose of the ADC is to digitize the analog input signal to a digital bit stream.

To illustrate the digitization, the time domain representation of the input signal is displayed on the
left. This is the signal that is physically received by the monitoring receiver. In order to display the
frequency domain representation in the spectrum, the signal is digitized.

To digitize an analog signal, two basic operations are necessary. Due to the nature of digital
numbers, it is not possible to have an infinite number of amplitude values.
Therefore, the amplitude must be quantized. By doing this, the amplitude can be represented with
a finite number of bits. The related parameter is called Bit-Resolution. The bit resolution states
how fine the amplitude values can be quantized.

As second operation, the signal is sampled in time domain. The time difference between to
samples is determined by the sampling rate of the ADC. The sampling rate is directly related to
the Real-Time bandwidth respectively instantaneous bandwidth of the ADC.

As a result, the digital bit stream representation of the analog input signal is output. For each time
an amplitude value is output.

45
Having the digital representation of the input signal, various processing steps are performed.
Here, an advantage of professional monitoring receivers is that they have several processing
paths in parallel.

To get a rough overview over the main digital functionalities, we will use the signal processing of
the R&S EB500 as an example.

After the signal is digitized using one of the two ADC paths,

46
,the signal is forwarded to two parallel processing paths.

The upper path is called spectrum path. As the name implies, this path is used to display the
spectrum in the graphical user interface.

The lower path is the demodulation and measurement path. This path is used to perform accurate
measurements on the input signal and to produce demodulated audio content.

As already mentioned, the spectrum calculation is carried out simultaneously with accurate
measurements and demodulation. This offers a great advantage since the paths do not have to be
switched and both paths are optimized for their specific tasks.

47
At last, there are further digital and analogue outputs in the bottom section.
Here, the digitized and demodulated signal can be output analog or digital. Subsequent equipment
or software may use the output for further processing. Also, the listening-in is provided here by
either jack output or built-in loudspeaker.

48
To display the frequency representation of the input signal, the Discrete Fourier Transform (DFT)
is used. In short, the DFT uses a set of time samples or bins, called window, to calculate the same
amount of frequency samples.

In this example, a sampled single frequency sine signal is transformed to the frequency domain.
For this example we will assume a very high number of DFT bins to achieve a high resolution in
frequency domain.

In the frequency domain, only the bin representing the frequency of the sine will have a greater
value then 0. In praxis, every bin will have a certain value due to noise.

49
When performing the same procedure with a sine signal having a higher frequency, the peak in
the DFT result will be correspondingly at a higher frequency. At the exact frequency the sine is
oscillating.

50
To show the relation between the number of DFT points in time and frequency domain, we will
reduce the number of samples to just four. Calculating the DFT of 4 samples will give us the result
shown on the right.
If we now imagine a more complex time domain signal consisting of several frequency
components, the frequency resolution will most probably not be sufficient to show all the individual
frequency components and their magnitude.

51
Using the same ADC and the same sampling rate, we could use the double amount of samples.
By using 8 samples, the frequency resolution improves significantly and a more detailed view will
be possible.

However, measuring the double amount of samples also requires the double amount of time. This
means that the DFT representation reacts significantly slower to signal changes and short signal
pulses may not be represented appropriately.

This is a very typical tradeoff in signal processing. An increased frequency resolution always
results in a decreased time resolution. For optimum results, this effect has to be considered.

52
So, the purpose of the spectral path is to calculate the frequency domain representation of the
input signal.

The is done using the discrete Fourier Transform, which is implemented as Fast Fourier
Transform.

Depending on the FFT-window length, a certain number of samples are used to fill an FFT
window.
With this window as input, the FFT spectrum is calculated and displayed
Afterwards, the next window is filled, calculated, and displayed.

53
As explained before, FFT calculation is a serial process.

After sampling the signal, which is called signal acquisition, the frequency domain representation
is calculated. This is called signal processing.
The output of the signal processing is the spectrum.
In this architecture, the input signal is no longer sampled while the signal processing is being
performed. This results in an acquisition gap of the monitoring receiver.

Since the application of a monitoring receiver is to receive all signals in the air, acquisition gaps
are not justifiable. Therefore, one of the most important features of professional radiomonitoring
receivers is the gap-free signal acquisition. This is ensured by using two parallel processing paths
within the spectrum path and overlapping FFTs. Using this architecture, monitoring receiver
process input signals gap-free and without information loss.

54
To summarize, the spectrum path is used to display the IF spectrum. The IF bandwidth is a
parameter that is typically adjustable between a certain minimum bandwidth and the real-time
bandwidth as maximum.

Since many thousands FFTs are calculated each second, it is not possible to display each
individual FFT spectrum on the screen. Therefore, different display modes are used to combine
several spectra. Common display modes are Average, Min Hold and Max Hold and Clear/Write.

55
The second path in the signal processing architecture is the demodulation and measurement path.

The main tasks of this path are accurate measurements and demodulation of signals.
Accurate measurements are for example precise level measurements using a digital wideband
detector. Furthermore, ITU conform measurements require specific algorithms to be compliant
with the regulations.

Demodulation is done using several digital demodulation algorithms. The most common
demodulators are AM, FM, PM and CW. Depending on the receiver, there may be more or less
standards supported.

Another application of this path is the wideband I/Q output of the IF bandwidth. Here, the raw I/Q
data is streamed to subsequent systems like recorders, signal analysis or external decoders.
Furthermore, demodulated signals as well as the accurate measurement results can be output
here.

Due to the separation of the spectrum path and the demodulation path, both paths can be used
and parameterized independently. This offers a great advantage for many applications.

56
For this exercise, please match the spectral path and the measurement/demodulation path with
their purpose.

57
Lastly, DDCs are another important part of the signal processing architecture.

Simply said, DDC are narrowband versions of the demodulation/measurement path.

DDC can be placed arbitrarily within the IF bandwidth. The amount of DDC depends heavily on
the receiver and may start from 1 or 2 up to thousands of narrowband channels. They are used to
listen into several transmission within the spectrum at the same time. Parameters like frequency,
bandwidth, squelch and demodulation method can be set individually for each DDC.

Furthermore, DDC are also used to stream datastreams to different destinations with reduced
bandwidth. For example in COMINT applications, these different destinations may be various
operators or external decoders. This way, several transmissions can be monitored and processed
in parallel.

58
In this chapter we covered the main building blocks of monitoring receivers and der purpose.

The antenna matrix selects one antenna inputs according to user defined criteria. The main
criteria for the antenna selection is the frequency range of interest.
The preselection uses different types of filters to reduce to the total signal load for subsequent
stages.
The gain control attenuates or amplifies the input signal to optimize the signal level for the next
stage. The gain control is typically implemented using amplifiers and attenuators at various stages
of the analog frontend.

In the frequency conversion stage, the input frequency range is converted to the intermediate
frequency. The final IF is exactly that frequency, at which the analog to digital converter operates.
The conversion process can be done using none, one or up to three different IF stages, depending
on the input frequency range. The A/D converter digitizes the analog input signal to a digital
datastream.

In the signal processing stage, the signal is processing in various ways in order to obtain the
wanted results. In the first path, the spectrum is calculated and displayed gapless and in real-time.
The second path is used to demodulate audio signals or to perform various types of
measurements on the input signal.

59
Thank you for watching the eTraining understanding the „Fundamentals of
Monitoring Receivers “.

60
In this eTraining, we have learned that monitoring receivers are used to investigate, display and
analyze the spectrum in various ways.
The Prime applications of monitoring receivers are spectrum monitoring and signals intelligence.
Amongst others, the main properties of monitoring receivers is the signal reception using
wideband antennas and the fast scan speed.
We have covered the main building blocks of monitoring receivers and explained their purpose. As
you have learned, each building block is optimized for the tasks and applications faced by
monitoring receivers

61