Android revisited ...

Now I have a new Android pad I have been working on some enhancements to the Android client code. This Android pad has a 1.2GHz processor and an 800x600 screen so is much more usable. Video could be better - I need to buy a new camera. The clicking sound in the video is the lens trying to focus! I have also seen that there is an environment to build and run Qt Applications on the Android. I will have to investigate to see if it is possible to run QtRadio.




And Below is the same application running on an HTC Magic mobile phone. You can see the 8" pad behind it to get an idea of the size. The phone has a scroll wheel that is a nice interface for tuning!




If anyone has an Android device that is running at least version 2.2 then you are welcome to try the application. It currently can connect to my server when it is running (most of the time). Please note that it is working with a version of dspserver that has not been released yet so will not work with any existing ghpsdr3 systems. I have been working on some performance enhancements that help the android client.

The application is at http://g0orx.dyndns.org.

HPSDRServer

I now have a fully working version of the HPSDRServer for Metis (Ozy will be added soon) with the web interface. Currently running the standard dspserver, but a new version will be available soon also with a web interface.

It will support multiple receivers and will allow selection of which receiver is routed back out to Mercury.

Now I can run the server on a headless machine and use the web interface to control and monitor it.

It is written as a Qt Console Application and should run on any platform.

PennyWSPR

I configured and loaded PennyWSPR into my Penelope card. Running about 250mW into a 40 Mtr dipole in the attic.

Best spot so far was from VK6BN in Western Australia for a distance of 14550km. Not bad for 250mW! The time was 2228 GMT and 2234 GMT which I make to be just around sunrise in Western Australia.

Embedded web interface for ghpsdr3

I have been working on using a web interface to control the ghpsdr3 server rather than having to stop/start from the command line. I am currently using Mongoose as the embedded web server (this may change).


When the server is not running you can select between using Metis (Ethernet) or Ozy/Magister (USB) as the interface. If using Metis you an select the interface and discover the Metis devices on that interface and select the Metis device to use.




When the server is running it displays the selected device information and also shows a list of client connections.

You can change the preamp, random, dither and clock source settings when it is running or when it is stopped. With some changes to the protocol I will also be able to change the sample rate.

Hopefully we can get a version of this running on Metis itself once I have the soft core processor running.

Metis boot loader

I now have some code to work with the Metis boot loader to allow you to read the MAC address, read and write the IP address and erase and program the FPGA flash memory.

It has been written using Qt 4 and uses the libpcap library for the raw ethernet interface. I have compiled and tested on Linux and Max OS X. It should also work on Windows.

This is intended as a disaster recovery method of reprogramming the FPGA on Metis.

Winter has come early this year

About 8 inches of snow on Wednesday (1st December) and after clearing drive we had another 12 inches over night.

New broadband provider

I have switch broadband providers from BT to BE. I was getting about 5Mb downlink and 330Kb uplink with BT.