User`s manual

Manual revision 016 Section 4: Deploying and Operating FastCAT SBE 49

Setup for Deployment

Program the FastCAT for the intended deployment using Seaterm

(see Command Descriptions).

• Seasave, our real-time data acquisition program, generates a data file with

data format and header information that is compatible with our

SBE Data Processing post-processing software. If the FastCAT will be

connected directly to the computer or to an SBE 33 or 36 Deck Unit and

you will be using Seasave to acquire and view real-time data, you must

set OutputFormat=0 (output raw hexadecimal data).

• If the FastCAT will be connected directly to the computer and you will be

using Seaterm to view real-time data, you must press Capture on the

Toolbar to save the data to a .cap file. Note that Seaterm does not

generate a data file that is compatible with SBE Data Processing.

For ease in viewing data, set OutputFormat=3 (output decimal

engineering units).

• If the FastCAT will be connected to an ROV, AUV, etc., the vehicle must

include a data logger for the FastCAT data. Typically, this data will not

be in a format that is compatible with SBE Data Processing. However, if

the data logger saves all the FastCAT data (complete time series) to a

verbatim (unaltered) file, preserving the exact data format output by the

FastCAT, the file can be processed with SBE Data Processing, after some

additional file manipulation to add required header information. To

generate a file that you can ultimately use in SBE Data Processing, you

must set OutputFormat=3 (output decimal engineering units).

Note:

See Acquiring Real-Time Data with

ROV, AUV, etc. for Processing by

Sea-Bird Software.

Note:

See Acquiring and Processing Data with

Seasave and SBE Data Processing.