[Elecraft] N-gen

[Ed Lambert]

I had an opportunity to visit a very sophisticated lab on Wednesday where
they were testing a complex software/hardware system whose implementation
requires an almost perfect detection rate of positive events while achieving
almost zero false alarms. (What else is new?) This is a public safety system
where errors in either direction are capable of large loss of life and huge
costs. 

 

(The company involved expects the system to generate almost $700M in
revenues over the next five years; this is a large effort.)

 

A part of the system is a data link implemented mostly through a UHF and VHF
radio channel.  I asked them how they accounted for random noise in the test
process. They walked me behind a rack of equipment and there, amidst its
orders of magnitude more expensive brethren, was a tiny little Elecraft
N-gen happily generating noise 24/7. I asked where it came from because I
wanted to talk "Elecraft" with another amateur, but nobody seemed to know.
It just seemed to have appeared one day. More Elecraft MOJO?

 

Ed Lambert PE