Boltek StormTracker-PCI - Manual (Page 5)

INTRODUCTION 1
Introduction
Congratulations on your purchase of the StormTracker Lightning Detector. You will find
StormTracker to be a useful tool in determining if there is lightning in your area, finding
the location of storms, and determining whether storms are coming your way.
StormTracker uses a direction-finding antenna to receive and locate the radio signals
produced by lightning. The strength of the received signal is used to calculate
approximately how far the strike is away. The combination of direction and distance
allows the strike to be plotted onto a radar-like screen, the receiver location being the
center of the screen with distance increasing outwards from the center.
As well as showing the current lightning activity, lightning data may be replayed in fast
motion, displaying several hours of storm activity in a few seconds. You can see the
natural progression of storms as they form and later die out.
StormTracker consists of:
 PCI style receiver board which you will install in your computer
 direction-finding antenna
 50 foot antenna cable
 software on CD-ROM
 manual
You will need to:
 install the receiver board in your computer
 let Windows load the device drivers for the PCI card
 install the display software onto your computer's hard drive
 configure the software
 route the antenna cable
 mount the antenna
 wait for a thunderstorm
The installation section of the manual will take you through each of these steps. After
completing these steps your StormTracker lightning detector should be operational. If
you have difficulties getting your detector to work properly the troubleshooting section
will help you determine the cause of the problem.