If you have a PC that is a tad slow for the Powerflex software or your running Windows 98 or ME, try the link below.

< >

The latest version of the software is Ver .95

The software is not as advanced as the Powerflex software but it will let you try out your SR-40 and see what all the raucous is about.

There is no CW mode, but you can receive it in SSB mode, the filters are adjustable can be made quite narrow.
It has some nice features such as the fact that the Panoramic Display can be 3KHz, 6KHz, 12KHz, 24KHz, or 48KHz, the noise filter works quite well also, and it's very simple the setup.

Enjoy



Cecil Bayona
KD5NWA
www.qrpradio.com

I fail to see why doing the same thing over and over and getting the same results every time is insanity: I've almost proved it isn't; only a few more tests now and I'm sure results will differ this time ...

Very sorry Jose. AmQRP has sold out their supply of SoftRock40 kits and the kits I had have also been sold. Best chance to get a kit at this point is to look for someone who deceides not to build the kit they purchased.

There is a possibility that I will do a small kit run in a few weeks.

73,
Tony KB9YIG

Hi to ALL

Just arriving: I would like to get one kit too :-)

Who can help, telling me what to do?

YOUR suggestions are HIGHLY ***appreciated***

Many thanks in advance for ALL your support!

73

de Jose Silva
CT1AXG

Well, the saga continues.

After 2 days of hell, I'm hearing signals on 40 meters with my softrock.

Currently listening to VA3YP on ssb, 7042 Khz.

In a nutshell, I think I installed the transformer wrong. I wound a new one with 3 color wire from my junkbox, and reinstalled.

The new transformer didn't work at all. Finally, just a few minutes ago I found a solder short, which would have been found much sooner if I had taken the time to clean the flux off the board.

Anyway, I'm up and running and looking forward to building the softrock-LF. Thanks to all who made suggestions, especially the gentleman who suggested using color coded wore for the transformer. A wise man indeed!

Regards,

Art

Thanks for the update, Chuck. Glad to hear it is working for you.
The cap values are not too critical. As long as you can get the
crystal to oscillate, and have enough level out out that it triggers
the comparator that follows it, it will run the digital portions of
the circuit. So, if others don't have 33pf caps on hand, you can try
22, 27 or, like Chuck, 39 pF.

73, Bruce N1RX

--- In softrock40@..., Chuck Carpenter <w5usj@9...>
wrote:

Bruce and All,

Just did the minor mods needed to change bands and all is working
FB. Signals are fair this time of day from about -135 to -100 dBm

on some

sigs.

I didn't have 33pF caps for C6 and C7 so I used 39pF np0/c0g

instead.

Will be looking to see what the panadapter looks like when there

is a DX

pileup happening...[g]


Chuck Carpenter, W5USJ, Point, TX -|- Rains Co. -|- EM22cv -|- 72

es 73

50 years -|- 19 - K2OFN and 31 - W5USJ -|- Most fun = QRP since

1984.

www.w5usj.com hosted by Hamnutz.com -|- NeTxQRP www.netxqrp.com

Took a little work and troubleshooting, but it feels like a whole new
world just opened up... Wow!

Ed
AA1WZ

Bruce and All,

I had installed DIP pins for the crystal and the two capacitors to facilitate the band change.


Chuck Carpenter, W5USJ, Point, TX -|- Rains Co. -|- EM22cv -|- 72 es 73
50 years -|- 19 - K2OFN and 31 - W5USJ -|- Most fun = QRP since 1984.
www.w5usj.com hosted by Hamnutz.com -|- NeTxQRP www.netxqrp.com

Bruce and All,

Just did the minor mods needed to change bands and all is working FB. Signals are fair this time of day from about -135 to -100 dBm on some sigs.

I didn't have 33pF caps for C6 and C7 so I used 39pF np0/c0g instead.

Will be looking to see what the panadapter looks like when there is a DX pileup happening...[g]


Chuck Carpenter, W5USJ, Point, TX -|- Rains Co. -|- EM22cv -|- 72 es 73
50 years -|- 19 - K2OFN and 31 - W5USJ -|- Most fun = QRP since 1984.
www.w5usj.com hosted by Hamnutz.com -|- NeTxQRP www.netxqrp.com

Bill,

I found it (Display Tab, Setup Book) and set it down from 15 to 6. That made a big difference. I see a message from Cecil that suggests several other options for reducing the CPU busy time. I'll mess around with things and see what seems to work best for this laptop (.

Thanks! Still having fun with SR-40...

If the sigs got better with the window minimized it's hinting the computer
can't keep up with updating the spectrum display. You can try turning it
off,. or turning down the refresh rate -- there's a setting somewhere in
the setup pages that lets you set the refresh rate for the display.

Chuck Carpenter, W5USJ, Point, TX -|- Rains Co. -|- EM22cv -|- 72 es 73
50 years -|- 19 - K2OFN and 31 - W5USJ -|- Most fun = QRP since 1984.
www.w5usj.com hosted by Hamnutz.com -|- NeTxQRP www.netxqrp.com

If your PC is marginally slow you will get the breakup of the audio when you do other things.

Try this, it should help;

Bring up the Setup Screen
Click on the Display Tab
There is a item labeled "Main Display FPS:", it has small up and down arrows next to it, and the default is 15
Click on the down arrow, and bring it down to about 8
Click on "Apply"
Click on "OK"
close the window.

Most of the CPU is busy displaying the Panadapter window, we just told it to display 8 times a second instead of 15 times a second. You should see your CPU usage displayed in the lower left hand corner go down.

Another thing you can try is to turn of the S meter;

Above the S Meter there is a box labeled "RxMeter" next to it is a down arrow, click on the arrow, click on off.

This will also reduce the amount of CPU usage.

One more thing, we can tell the software to treat itself as more important than other programs so it's not interrupted.

Bring up the "Setup Screen"
Click on the "General" tab, but it should be there anyway.
A little lower than the middle and on the right side of the screen there is a box labeled "Process Priority"
Click on the down arrow in the box, a list should show up, click on "High"

This tells windows that the audio processing is more important than anything else and should not be made to wait.

Hope this helps.




At 08:33 AM 10/9/2005, Chuck Carpenter wrote:

SR-40ers,

PA contest this morning provided lots of signals to check out. Also a RTTY
thing early this morning.

Had several things running like email and such and some strong signals
sounded rather choppy. I minimized the PowerSDR window to do something in
email and the signal cleared up -- no longer choppy.

OK if you just wanted to listen to the one signal but not too useful for
tuning around...[g]

Better to close all the other applications and open windows of course but
interesting anyway -- maybe.


Chuck Carpenter, W5USJ, Point, TX -|- Rains Co. -|- EM22cv -|- 72 es 73
50 years -|- 19 - K2OFN and 31 - W5USJ -|- Most fun = QRP since 1984.
www.w5usj.com hosted by Hamnutz.com -|- NeTxQRP www.netxqrp.com





Yahoo! Groups Links










--
No virus found in this incoming message.
Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.
Version: 7.0.344 / Virus Database: 267.11.13/124 - Release Date: 10/7/2005

Cecil Bayona
KD5NWA
www.qrpradio.com

I fail to see why doing the same thing over and over and getting the same results every time is insanity: I've almost proved it isn't; only a few more tests now and I'm sure results will differ this time ...

If the sigs got better with the window minimized it's hinting the computer can't keep up with updating the spectrum display. You can try turning it off,. or turning down the refresh rate -- there's a setting somewhere in the setup pages that lets you set the refresh rate for the display.

BTW - the cpu intensiveness of the spectrum update is a known issue. There's potential for making it much less CPU intensive by using DirectX video interfaces. Now we just need to find someone skilled in such things to write the code.

Regards,

Bill (kd5tfd)

SR-40ers,

PA contest this morning provided lots of signals to check out. Also a RTTY thing early this morning.

Had several things running like email and such and some strong signals sounded rather choppy. I minimized the PowerSDR window to do something in email and the signal cleared up -- no longer choppy.

OK if you just wanted to listen to the one signal but not too useful for tuning around...[g]

Better to close all the other applications and open windows of course but interesting anyway -- maybe.


Chuck Carpenter, W5USJ, Point, TX -|- Rains Co. -|- EM22cv -|- 72 es 73
50 years -|- 19 - K2OFN and 31 - W5USJ -|- Most fun = QRP since 1984.
www.w5usj.com hosted by Hamnutz.com -|- NeTxQRP www.netxqrp.com

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I should have that first cup of coffee before typing.....

May answers in-line below.

These answers are also good through October.

If you transmit on 7.046, you should see a signal on the panadapter >

display near that frequency. You should then also see an "image"

of that peak somewhere near 7.062 on the panadapter.

My early morning math skills also leave something to be desired...

7.056 + 10Khz = 7.066 Image frequency, not 7.062.

Off to the coffee pot.....
-Bruce.

Good Morning, Jim.

May answers in-line below.

--- In softrock40@..., "James Miller" <jimwmiller1@m...>
wrote:

Good morning.

I've just completed the assemble and some initial testing of the

SoftRock40. The green led lights up and the Fixed HW Osc @ 7.056MHz
can be seen and heard. That's about all that works since the
SoftRock40 does not appear to be receiving any signals from the
antenna. There are two issues/questions follow:

ISSUE#1: Under "Configure & Use", step#4 is not clear. It says "

With the oscillator running, tune to the frequency that is as much
above 7.056 MHz as the test oscillator is set below 7.056 MHz."

I'm not sure what this means! Does this mean that an external

signal generator should be connected and tuned to (7.056MHz -n),
while the SoftRock is set to (7.056MHz +n)??? Please explain.

Correct. You must inject an external signal here. I use an XG-2 from
Elecraft. Another good method is to take your HF rig, and transmit
into a dummy load while listening on the SoftRock. If you transmit
on 7.046, you should see a signal on the panadapter display near
that frequency. You should then also see an "image" of that peak
somewhere near 7.062 on the panadapter. THAT is the peak you will be
trying to null with the DSP image reject controls.

ISSUE#2: I'm not able to null any images under "images" as

described in step#4. (In fact I do not see an image, only the
7.056MHz test signal.)

Until you get a signal into the SoftRock, there won't be any images
to null out. But, I would have expected some signals to appear on
the panadapter when you connected an antenna. You might want to
start by double-checking all your soldering and component placement.

I hope my explanation of the nulling procedure helps, and good luck!

73, Bruce N1RX

Chris,

Would there be an objection to having a small icon in the try down at the bottom next to the start button...[g]

You can drag the icon into the tray and remove it from the desktop.


Chuck Carpenter, W5USJ, Point, TX -|- Rains Co. -|- EM22cv -|- 72 es 73
50 years -|- 19 - K2OFN and 31 - W5USJ -|- Most fun = QRP since 1984.
www.w5usj.com hosted by Hamnutz.com -|- NeTxQRP www.netxqrp.com

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At 09:53 PM 10/8/2005, Chris wrote:

* As described in the configure and Use part of the Softrock manual under item #5, I went in and set the frequency tab to 7.040 Mhz and -60 dBm (this is what my generator was set to). Do I have to click on the start buttons to the right of the fields to calibrate or just Apply and OK? This computer reads -70 dBm for the test signal, and the computer in our office read -60 dBm which is correct but I couldn't remember if I had clicked Start before and now that almost everything is right I don't want to hose up anything else. I was able to null the image way down there to where it was almost undetectable, much lower with this really old 1999 vintage desktop than with my wife's new laptop. Less noise I guess.

You need to press the start button to get it to calibrate.

* I checked my generator 's display against a recently calibrated frequency counter and it is 7.040 on the dot. But when I tune to 7.040 with VFO A on the SDR console I hear and see nothing. I have to tune to 7.042 to hear the signal and the signal is over near -800. I have found that the signal peak must be within the green box on the panadapter to be heard. How does one zero beat a signal with this- is the frequency listed under VFO A at the extreme right or left of the screen?

The green box on the panadapter shows the current passband. You can change it with the filter controls on the lower right of the screen, There are some presets there, as well as a width and shift slider, or you can set the upper/lower limits of the pass band. We do not lack for filter setting flexibility.

As to the VFO display, it depends on the mode you are in. The VFO reads the center of the Panadapter display when in non CW modes. In CW mode it will read 600 hz (actually whatever the CW offset is set to) above/below depending in if you're in CWU or CWL. To zero beat a sig put the Panadapter display in Avg mode and press the 0 beat button. For CW it will center the sig at the CW offset value. For AM it will center the peak at 0, for SSB modes it will put the peak in the center of the passband (the green area in the Panadpater). Admittedly not very useful for SSB modes --
I'd really like to find some time to do automatic tuning of an SSB signal -- would be a nice demo of the capabilities of an SDR.

* When installing the program with the various 3 computers I used for this installation experience I have had to go in and change things like PTT disable , Audio-Direct vs MME and enabling the Softrock board and entering the LO frequency. I have had to uninstall the program a few times, and I do so using the Add/Remove programs icon under Windows control panel. When I went back to reinstall the programs, these options were already selected for me. How did the new install know these things? Did teh Add/remove programs not remove everything? I was just curious on this one in case I ever needed to do a clean uninstall?

I believe Add/Remove Programs will remove everything but the PowerSDR.mdb file. If you want to remove with extreme prejudice, do Add/Remove programs and then remove the directory PowerSDR was installed to. As far as I know I does not scribble any magic registry values.

Thanks again for such a neat little rig and all the help.

Chris
KD4PBJ
Raleigh, NC

Regards,

Bill (kd5tfd)

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• As described in ?the configure and Use part of the Softrock manual under item #5, I went in and set the frequency tab to 7.040 Mhz and -60 dBm (this is what my generator was set to).? Do I have to click on the start buttons to the right of the fields to calibrate?or just Apply and OK?? This computer reads -70 dBm for the test signal, and the computer in our office read -60 dBm which is correct but I couldn't remember if I had clicked Start before and now that almost everything is right I don't want to hose up anything else.? I was able to null the image way down there to where it was almost undetectable,?much lower with this really old 1999 vintage desktop than with my wife's new laptop.? Less noise I guess.
• I checked my generator 's display against a recently calibrated frequency counter and it is 7.040 on the dot.? But when I tune to 7.040 with VFO A on the SDR console I hear and see nothing.? I have to tune to 7.042 to hear the signal and the signal is over near -800.?? I have found that the signal peak must be within the green box on the panadapter to be heard.? How does one zero beat a signal with this- is the frequency listed under VFO A at the extreme right or left of the screen?
• When installing the program?with the?various 3 computers I used for this installation experience I have had to go in and change things like PTT disable , Audio-Direct vs MME and enabling the Softrock board and entering the LO frequency. ?I have had to uninstall the program a few times, and I do so using the Add/Remove?programs icon under Windows control panel.? When I went back to reinstall the programs, these options were already selected for me.? How did the new install know these things??Did teh Add/remove programs not remove everything?? I was just curious on this one in case I ever needed to do a clean uninstall?

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Stan Rife
W5EWA
Houston, TX
K2 S/N 4216
?