[hpsdr] Atlas Update - From whence we have come

Mon May 8 21:07:51 PDT 2006

Eric,
Excitement anf faith in a technical project only get you so far, sometimes it clouds judgement. 

What I'm advocating is the same thing Bob said in his reply to my post. We need to use sound engineering practices and reviews to go through the designs. There is no hurry to get a passive backplane out the door, better to wait and get a high quality, working system sometime "this summer". Just building something without making sure it works does not help to advance the state-of-the-art for amateur radio. If there are unforseen design problems, it will only frustrate people trying to use the HPDSR and hurt the process.

There are still a number of basic questions unanswered, things like, but not limited to:
What are the form factors for the plug-in cards? 
What are the specifics of the ATLAS bus (some of it is written down, but there are a bunch of blanks)?
Is a 10MHz or a 1pps reference signal going to be supported? If so, it it going to be distributed over the backplane? 
Are the JTAG connectors going to be put in a common location on the top of each plug-in card? 
Does OZY have the throughput to handle both a MERCURY and a JANUS board operating at the same time? 

What the project need is some design documentation, so that folks who want to design a curcuit know how to integrate it in. I'd be tickled pink with some block diagrams!

So, yes, I would hold my order until the group has a baselined design for JANUS, OZY and ATLAS. JANUS is going through a redesign currently! If I have to I'll run a set of boards myself.

I am more than happy to work on documentation, but it's going to take lots of questions and the corresponding answers.
A valid answer to a question can be "we don't know yet".

Alex, N3NP

----- Original Message ----
From: Eric Ellison <ecellison at comcast.net>
To: Alex <harvilchuck at yahoo.com>; hpsdr at hpsdr.org
Sent: Monday, May 8, 2006 11:06:32 PM
Subject: RE: [hpsdr] Atlas Update - From whence we have come

             <!--  _filtered { margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in;}   _filtered {font-family:Tahoma; panose-1:2 11 6 4 3 5 4 4 2 4;} /* Style Definitions */  p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal 	{margin:0in; margin-bottom:.0001pt; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman";} a:link, span.MsoHyperlink 	{color:blue; text-decoration:underline;} a:visited, span.MsoHyperlinkFollowed 	{color:purple; text-decoration:underline;} span.emailstyle17 	{font-family:Arial; color:windowtext;} span.EmailStyle18 	{ font-family:Arial; color:navy;}  _filtered { margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in;} div.Section1 	{} -->     Alex

   Hmmmm good question(s).

   I have faith in the excitement! I have faith in the project leaders. I have faith and proof that we will get to Ozy board 2 and have an operational experimental platform. I have faith in all the contributors and even the lurkers who respond when I ‘ping’.

   I also have faith because of people like Chris Day who is sending me his entire alpha Atlas setup in the mail so that Lyle can show ‘first light’ at Dayton , and all the contributors who are part of the village and giving like Chris. Also that we will reach the goal(s) without being overly structured by ‘time lines’ production schedules etc.

   I guess the shorter answer, is that my wife would only let me have $2000 to upfront purchase of the Atlas boards. Also I only have about $800 in PlayPal money to sponsor a few Alpha boards for each project leader. (shhhh She who must be obeyed, does not know I have the PlayPal money!)

   If you have a lot of faith as a user, order as many boards as you need. If you have only a little faith, don’t order any. Net – Net, you only lose about $15 per board if the house of cards folds.

   I’m sort of angling that I’ll get enough funds back in from the Atlas to turn around and offer the Ozy and Janus!  With the crude ‘operation’ I have set up, I can produce and get the current 175 board orders out in about 15 days. It’s a lot easier than sponsoring a group buy. That MAY come, but for now it’s strictly a village and not a corporation.

   In the end? It’s inspiring to be alive and a ham radio operator with this group, each moving a grain of sand!

   Eric

  From: Alex [mailto:harvilchuck at yahoo.com] 
 Sent: Monday, May 08, 2006 9:49 PM
 To: Eric Ellison; hpsdr at hpsdr.org
 Subject: Re: [hpsdr] Atlas Update - From whence we have come

         Not to throw a wet blanket on the enthusiasm, but why order the boards for ATLAS when there isn't a reviewed and baselined design for the JANUS and OZYMANDIAS cards? The better thing to do would be order the three board set at once. 

 What if a date is sat to complete design reviews on  OZYMANDIAS v1.0 and JANUS v1.0? How about June 8th?
 If the date is met, then shoot for board ordering in mid-june.

 Personally, I'm thinking of ordering a couple, but I'd like to see that there is a working system, not just a passive backplane.

 I've read that the ATLAS is using standard PC case spacing between cards. Are the actual cards going to have a physical size of a full-height, half-length PCI card (so as to effectively use the PC-case)? 

 What is being done is good, but just like building Eagle, there has to be a little order and structure and documentation.
 I'm willing to contribute with the documentation and coordination, because this is one of the "skunkworks" of amateur radio.

 Alex, N3NP

 ----- Original Message ----
 From: Eric Ellison <ecellison at comcast.net>
 To: hpsdr at hpsdr.org
 Sent: Sunday, May 7, 2006 2:41:49 PM
 Subject: [hpsdr] Atlas Update - From whence we have come
     ***** High Performance Software Defined Radio Discussion List *****

    Folks

   We now have 170 orders for the Atlas board. WOW! To me this indicates that the flywheel of the project is accelerating! To think this all came about from a Teamspeak Friday Night fourm mention by Phil – VK6APH in late November 2005 regarding the Xylo work he was doing!!!! With Phil – N8VB’s Ozy board coming along it will mark a fully working product! This first of many! YEA! 

   Thanks EVERYONE no matter what your contribution, including those just lurking and waiting till it all works! I see this project as “Hardware which just keeps getting better”.  We are a ‘village’ and our population is growing! Viva open ideas! Viva open source! Viva Open hardware! It IS, to me what Amateur Radio is all about ---- always on the forefront of technology!

   I am planning to order the Atlas boards next week. I estimate that shipment of boards will be before the end of the month. Still no final decision on the production house, but it will be RoHS compliant board.

   Thanks!
   Eric – AA4SW

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