[hpsdr] Blackfin

[Philip Covington]

On 7/13/07, James Courtier-Dutton <James at superbug.co.uk> wrote:
> Philip Covington wrote:
> >
> > Check out my QS1RT project:
> >
> > <http://pcovington.blogspot.com/2007/07/qs1rt-verb-pcb.html>
> >
> > The VERB connects to the PCI Express (there will be a PCI version too)
> > interface with either copper or optical fiber through SFP transceivers
> > at 2.5 Gbps using TI TLK2701 SERDES chips on both ends.  One lane (1X)
> > PCI Express is 2.5 Gbps so it matches nicely.
> >
> > I have successfully tested the system over 100 meters of fiber.   100
> > meters is the longest length I could borrow for testing and not the
> > limit.
> >
> > When external PCI Express become more widely available, it will be
> > easy to use with the PLX PCI Express to local bus interface chip that
> > I am using.
> >
> > 73 Phil N8VB
>
> Very nice. So external PCI Express seems to be the best choice at the
> moment.
>
> With that board only being about 15cm square, one could mount it on the
> tower, and then have an optical feed down to the PC on the ground.
>
> If one had two antennas, each tuned to different bands, could one just
> add the two ADC feeds and then do filtering and DSP processing, or would
> it be better to do the filtering and DSP processing before combining the
> ADC feeds? Obviously, some fine work would need to be done with cable
> lengths to ensure the phasing was correct before adding to two feeds.
>
> James
>

The idea is to allow different configurations depending on need.

The QS1RT VERB also has a USB 2.0 interface so it can be used stand
alone in applications where PCI or PCI Express is not convenient -
like laptops or as a test instrument.

The high speed serial interface allows the use of copper or fiber for
interconnection to the PC.  You can use it for remoting the board as
you described or for isolation from the PC.  When used as a system
with a mini-ITX board, the PCI to high speed optical interface allows
for a high bandwidth connection as well as isolation from the VERB.
The PCI and PCI Express interface board will have additional
processing capability through a Cyclone III FPGA.  You can then shift
the processing around to whatever you desire between the Cyclone III
on the VERB and the Cyclone III on the PCI/PCIe interface board.

A nice feature of the Cyclone III is that it supports byte wide
configuration.  Using port E on the FX2 or the MAX II/SERDES interface
configuration time for the FPGA is milliseconds.

73 Phil N8VB

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