What app are they using for the amplitude-v-time plots?
BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem
51–58 of 58 posts
Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem
#52Impressive 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…
Oddly enough, some folks like doing this because of the dopamine hit of really understanding how something works. FWIW I'm that kind of person :-). But I certainly understand it isn't for everyone. The platform I've been using to explore stuff like this is an Ultra96 board with a LimeSDR as the receiver. The Ultra96 has the Zynq Ultrascale FPGA on it. Given that USB3 latency is < 10 uSec I am guessing (hoping?) I can…
Yup, I love that feeling, I'm currently working on a software 3d renderer, I've always understood in principle how they work, but getting to actually implement one is really fun.
Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem
#53Impressive 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…
Oddly enough, some folks like doing this because of the dopamine hit of really understanding how something works. FWIW I'm that kind of person :-). But I certainly understand it isn't for everyone. The platform I've been using to explore stuff like this is an Ultra96 board with a LimeSDR as the receiver. The Ultra96 has the Zynq Ultrascale FPGA on it. Given that USB3 latency is < 10 uSec I am guessing (hoping?) I can…
Afaik USB3 latency is same as USB2, uSOFs every 125us, lowest round trip 2*125us
Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
It would matter to anyone who might want to build it in to a product.
This would be a horrible way to make a product which isn't a piece of test equipment. The power consumption and manufacturing cost is orders of magnitude higher than a specific purpose device.
I maintain that the original question was valid and it’s up to the product designer to determine whether the trade offs are worth it. I mentioned it because I am designing a farming robot where a very reliable Wifi device might be worth the cost and power consumption. I don’t know if this product is “very reliable” but lots of Wifi isn’t. I’m already considering that exact software defined radio for our robot so it could actually represent cost savings if it replaced the Wifi adapter.
Moreover I disliked the tone of the reply “why would you need to know the answer to your question, just do it and no one will notice.” It was a perfectly fine question to ask and I find it unreasonable to suggest it wasn’t worth asking without getting more information from the person asking it.
Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
This would be a horrible way to make a product which isn't a piece of test equipment. The power consumption and manufacturing cost is orders of magnitude higher than a specific purpose device.
I maintain that the original question was valid and it’s up to the product designer to determine whether the trade offs are worth it. I mentioned it because I am designing a farming robot where a very reliable Wifi device might be worth the cost and power consumption. I don’t know if this product is “very reliable” but lots of Wifi isn’t. I’m already considering that exact software defined radio for our robot so it c…
I did give you a reasonable answer to your reasonable question: no. But this device is pretty much going to not be reliable by definition.
As for getting more complicated, and "can you in general build an SDR into an end product" it's my understanding this is not a settled question. I don't see why not, but the FCC can more or less make laws and has previously shown it does not like the fact that you can put OpenWRT on your router.
Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
This would be a horrible way to make a product which isn't a piece of test equipment. The power consumption and manufacturing cost is orders of magnitude higher than a specific purpose device.
I maintain that the original question was valid and it’s up to the product designer to determine whether the trade offs are worth it. I mentioned it because I am designing a farming robot where a very reliable Wifi device might be worth the cost and power consumption. I don’t know if this product is “very reliable” but lots of Wifi isn’t. I’m already considering that exact software defined radio for our robot so it c…
Sorry, I didn't mean to offend.
Making a wifi adapter out of a software defined radio is going to be a less than ideal way to enable wifi to a product. The power consumption will be tremendously higher than a dedicated device. The cost for the electronics will be tremendously higher than a dedicated device. The cost to get an SDR which transmits certified for sale as a wifi device in every country you wish to sell it in will be expensive, especially compared to a dedicated wifi dongle which already has modular certifications.
Based on my experience, expect to pay upwards of $5k for an FCC compliance test report from a lab for a not intentionally emitting device which incorporates a certified wifi module. Expect to pay upwards of $25k for an FCC compliance test report for a device which is an intentional emitter (ie: you put an SDR inside your product as a wifi radio). If you want to sell outside of the USA, the ratio of costs is (in my experience) fairly similar for many other countries/regions of the world.
If you feel that you cannot find a reliable off the shelf pre-certified wifi module for your product, I think you would be best served to contact some lower volume wifi module vendors and to speak with them about why you feel their offerings are not reliable. They will likely be happy to help you, especially if they're competing with a multi-hundred dollar SDR for the design win.
Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem
#57Hey lazy question, so if you buy this and program it is it already FCC / CE certified for say 802.11a? And could you sell it like how companies sell RPis pre-packaged up with some software?
This is a guess, but it is a good one: no. It may not even be possible to get it certified (wrong interpretation of the law to me, but the government has more lawyers than anybody else). Many SDR boards don't have the power required to do actual transmission as it is hard to design a front end that pleases everyone, but equally as important, any real transmit power could mean the device is construed as non test equip…
Military and Police branches were one of the first big buyers of SDR products (ettus sold tens to hundreds of million of the stuff solely to those two). How do they handle certifications? Are they exempt?
Re: BladeRF-wiphy: Open-source, software defined radio modem
#58Nice one Nuand, the BladeRF v2 looks like a very interesting alternative SDR modem to the cheaper Adalm Pluto educational kit by Analog Devices, the manufacturer of the transceiver chip being used by the BladeRF v2.
There is another alternative open source WiFi stack, openwifi and it has been discussed in HN before [2][3].
[1]https://www.analog.com/en/design-center/evaluation-hardware-...