Decryption by an Intel 80386 – Military Style

Raytheon KGV-25 – Click to Enlarge

Sometimes we get processors in on boards that are just too interesting, or too good looking to remove.  That is the case with this KGV-25 correlator board.  It is a processing systems used for decrypting communications that was in wide use by the US (and likely other) militaries in the 1990’s.  The KGV-25 could receive encrypted UHF data at rates of up to 400Mbps as part of the Multi-Mission Advanced Tactical Terminal (MATT). More information on the MATT can be found here on the FAS website.

As is typical of military equipment the system did not use the latest and greatest available at the time (this board is from 1994 so the Pentium era).  The board is run by a time proven and reliable Intel 80386 processor running at 25MHz. In addition to the MQ80386-25/B (MIL-STD-883B spec 386 processor) the board contains:
Intel MQ82380-20/B  – DMA Controller for interfacing with all the assorted SRAM on the board
Intel MQ82592/B – LAN Controller for interfacing with the rest of the system
VLSI VM05403 USART – Universal Asynch/Synch Receiver Transmitter
and on the back is a MQ80387-25/B Math-coprocessor for the 386 and 4MB of 35ns SRAM

Essentially a complete 80386 system, of similar performance to a higher end system int he late 1980’s.  Just with a lot more gold, and built to take a lot more abuse then your average beige box of the 80’s