Moore's Law* Hits AESA Radars

It looks like manufacturers are starting to offer relatively inexpensive and low cost active, electronically-scanned array (AESA) radars as retrofits to existing aircraft. (Paid Subscription Required)

Basically, you have hundreds of solid state radars on a chip working together, and these chips are following the same trajectory as did processors and memory in the early days of the integrated circuit.

Raytheon is exhibiting its X-band Raytheon Advanced Combat Radar(RACR) at Farnborough^†, which is designed to be lighter, cheaper, and require less power (and thus less cooling is required).

These radars are not up to the performance of, for example the F-22's APG-77 radar, but they still provide a significant improvement in capability, including increased range, better resolution (with perhaps some anti-stealth capability), and the possibility of the radar being used for electronic warfare.

^*Moore's Law says that computer chips will double in power every 18 months (or 2 years depending on how you define power).
^†If anyone knows of a way for me to get an all-expense-paid trip to either the Farnborough or the Paris air show, and they need a kidney....