| Description: | Whereas the LOFAR1 receivers (RCUs) only deal with one channel at a time, in LOFAR 2.0 three channels need to be received simultaneously by RCU2. It therefore needs 3 of every filter, amplifier and ADC, while having the same PCB size and power consumption and better linearity than the LOFAR1 RCUs.
This challenge is tackled by a joint team of INAF and ASTRON. The photo shows the first RCU2-L (low band) prototype, where the analogue chain (left PCB with filters and amplifiers) was developed by INAF and the digitization side (right PCB) by ASTRON. The purpose of the prototype is to verify our simulations and to find problems before integrating it into one RCU2 PCB. And with more than 600 components on the two PCBs, we are pleasantly surprised by the small number of issues we had, most of which could be solved on the prototype PCB to give us a working prototype. Lab measurements show the prototype to behave as expected, and the next step is to integrate the prototype in the LOFAR2 lab test station in order to test the whole signal chain from the antenna to the FPGA.
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