WiNRADiO Marine Application Suite

Overview

The WiNRADiO Marine Application Suite is a high-performance system specially developed for marine applications. The WR-G305 receiver (supplied separately) is used to acquire signals across the HF/VHF/UHF frequency range to 1800 MHz, and when deployed with the Marine Application Suite provides a number of decoding facilities including HF Fax, NAVTEX, HF/VHF DSC and TELEX, as well as classical AM, SSB, CW and FM radio modes.

A GPS option is also available which integrates the receiver with a high-resolution global mapping facility.

This high-performance receiver is extremely sensitive and optimized to work with relatively short antennas, typically found in a marine environment, yet featuring a respectable dynamic range making the receiver resistant to strong signal overload. A separate Bias-T power injector such as the WR-BT-650 can be used to feed an active HF antenna such as the WR-AX-81S.

The Marine Application Suite for the WR-G305 Software Defined Radio

The Marine Application Suite is specifically designed for marine operators. The Graphical User Interface (GUI) runs in a sizeable window which can also be run full screen.

A WiNRADiO WR-G305 Software Defined Radio (SDR) is where most of the radio signal processing is performed in software, using digital signal processing methods, rather than using traditional hardware parts, resistors, capacitors, diodes, etc. The received signal is digitized early in the signal processing chain, and any further processing, demodulation and decoding of the digitized signal is then performed entirely in software.

There are many advantages to this approach, especially the flexibility of demodulation modes - new modes could potentially be added by simply upgrading software. The WR-G305 also performs better than a comparable conventional receiver, thanks to advanced signal processing techniques which make it possible to implement sharper selectivity filters, and more accurate demodulators and decoders than conventional hardware.

The performance of a Software Defined Radio receiver is also more consistent, stable and reliable because component tolerances and aging do not play such an important role as in a conventional receiver.

And finally, the WR-G305 receiver offers far more features and facilities than a conventional receiver. For example, the real-time spectrum analyzer with continuously variable bandwidth, graphical notch filter and IF recording are some of the many features which were previously unavailable on a conventional marine radio, in particular at such an affordable price level.