Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem

nuand.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 58 posts

Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem

#21

Post by samstave »

dfox wrote: post #18
samstave wrote: post #14

How is it that an SDR is being praised for a $1K price-point, but I can buy an FM/AM radio for single-digit $ - yet I pay $1,000 for a cell phone today and it doesnt have a native FM/AM radio on it? People keep saying "just use data" - which is what I think to be a fn bullshit response. give me a device that has actual FM/AM capabilities natively. Seriously - the most high-tech wireless device in my pocket MUST inclu…

While receiving analog radio is trivial for the processing required, it is fairly low frequency transmission which requires antenna sizes which are not entirely practical for phone-like device. I would even assume that many phones contain the required hardware (which usually involve using headset cable as antenna) but don't have any kind of software support for it because of combination of minimal demand for such a f…

I figured it would come down to antennas.... but I am still disappointed...

Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem

#22

Post by WrtCdEvrydy »

samstave wrote: post #21
dfox wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While receiving analog radio is trivial for the processing required, it is fairly low frequency transmission which requires antenna sizes which are not entirely practical for phone-like device. I would even assume that many phones contain the required hardware (which usually involve using headset cable as antenna) but don't have any kind of software support for it because of combination of minimal demand for such a f…

I figured it would come down to antennas.... but I am still disappointed...

AM/FM is really up to the handset manufacturer, some phones have the hardware turned off by the manufacturer.

Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem

#23

Post by minetest2048 »

ronsor wrote: post #16
axegon_ wrote: post #10

Veeery impressive! Side note: By pure coincidence I spent 5-6 hours this weekend playing around with an sdr dongle and a raspberry pi (specifically sending images over fm). And I have to say, the ecosystem around sdr's is annoyingly poor on linux(unsure about other os-es but it does seem windows has it better).

I feel like it's easier to toy around on Windows, but if you want to do anything (and I mean anything) serious, you'll need Linux. That's been my experience anyway.

In my experience, most of the signal decoders are Windows only (WXtoIMG to decode NOAA satellite images and DSD+ to decode digital walkie talkie signals comes to mind) but for actual real time RF DSP work, most of it is done in GNU Radio, and its practically Linux only even if it can be installed on Windows. And we haven't talked about transmit yet

Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem

#24

Post by wrycoder »

Reventlov wrote: post #17

Related projects: - https://github.com/bastibl/gr-ieee802-11 (gnuradio transceiver by the amazing Bastian Bloessl) - https://github.com/open-sdr/openwifi (efforts to make a low-cost SDR Wi-Fi transceiver) From my point of view, cool projects, all the hardware I have access to is closed source and sometimes I really wish I could just change some low level parameters in my Wi-Fi cards.

But are you willing to part with $720 to play with it?

Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem

#26

Post by [deleted] »

csboyer wrote: post #8
stagger87 wrote: post #7

Impressive project. Writing all the VHDL including the FFT and Viterbi decoder... I'm genuinely curious where the ROI on a project like comes from? Selling hardware and training materials? I'm assuming there must have been significant interest from customers, or maybe this is an ambitious employees side project? Can't wait to see a demo or some pictures of it running. Would love to see more details about the DSSS dem…

For DSSS demod, my guess is a 20 tap match filter designed from a resampled RRC filtered barker sequence. Haven’t looked at the VHDL, but that’s how I’d do it.

[deleted]

Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem

#27

Post by mjcohen »

WrtCdEvrydy wrote: post #22
samstave wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I figured it would come down to antennas.... but I am still disappointed...

AM/FM is really up to the handset manufacturer, some phones have the hardware turned off by the manufacturer.

A number of phones, including my Samsung Galaxy S10e, have the built-in FM radio enabled. It needs to have a earphone plugged in, which it uses as the antenna. The app is NextRadio.

Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem

#28

Post by samstave »

mjcohen wrote: post #27
WrtCdEvrydy wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AM/FM is really up to the handset manufacturer, some phones have the hardware turned off by the manufacturer.

A number of phones, including my Samsung Galaxy S10e, have the built-in FM radio enabled. It needs to have a earphone plugged in, which it uses as the antenna. The app is NextRadio.

Dope - is there any IOS equiv app? (or is this avail om IOS?)

Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem

#29

Post by PIKAL »

Speaking of radios, I’ve been trying to understand light recently and it’s difficult. I find that for most things, I have a visual intuitive model to reason about things. But I have a hard time visualizing RF light. There aren’t any good videos out there of just a straight forward visualization of RF light. It’s all abstractions with a sine wave, but no visceral visualizations, rendered or otherwise. The closest thing I’ve found is thought emporium visualizing wifi.

And also, why can visible light pass through other visible light without causing interference? Why can’t they make visible light with an antenna? Why are large arrays of RF receivers not more widely used for small-scale RF imaging?

Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem

#30

Post by the_only_law »

mjcohen wrote: post #27
WrtCdEvrydy wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AM/FM is really up to the handset manufacturer, some phones have the hardware turned off by the manufacturer.

A number of phones, including my Samsung Galaxy S10e, have the built-in FM radio enabled. It needs to have a earphone plugged in, which it uses as the antenna. The app is NextRadio.

I had a very cheap Android phone for a while that had this. Unfortunately, later flagship phones I got seemingly did not.
Post reply on HN