In this contribution we describe the hardware, firmware and software components of the readout system of the MAGIC-II Cherenkov telescope on the Canary island La Palma. The PMT analog signals are transmitted by means of optical fibers from the MAGIC-
II camera to the 80 m away counting house where they are routed to the new high bandwidth and fully programmable receiver boards (MONSTER), which convert back the signals from optical to electrical ones. Then the signals are split, one half provide the input signals for the level ONE trigger system while the other half is sent to the digitizing units. The fast Cherenkov pulses are sampled by low-power Domino Ring Sampler chips (DRS2) and temporarily stored in an array of 1024 capacitors. Signals are sampled at the ultra-fast speed of 2 GSample/s, which allows a very precise measurement of the signal arrival times in all pixels. They are then digitized with 12-bit resolution by an external ADC readout at 40 MHz speed. The Domino samplers are integrated in the newly designed mezzanines which equip a set of fourteen multi-purpose PULSAR boards. Finally, the data are sent through an S-LINK optical interface to a single computer. The entire DAQ hardware is controlled through a VME interface and steered by the slow control software program (MIR). The Data AcQuisition software program (DAQ) proceeds finally to the event building and data storage.
In February 2007 the MAGIC Air Cherenkov Telescope for gamma-ray astronomy was fully upgraded with an ultra fast 2 GSamples/s digitization system. Since the Cherenkov light flashes are very short, a fast readout can minimize the influence of the back
ground from the light of the night sky. Also, the time structure of the event is an additional parameter to reduce the background from unwanted hadronic showers. An overview of the performance of the new system and its impact on the sensitivity of the MAGIC instrument will be presented.
