[hpsdr] multiple receivers - is it really necessary

[Larry Gadallah]

2009/8/2 Bob McGwier <rwmcgwier at gmail.com>:
>
> It is tough to understand why anyone is this group would harbor neoluddite
> tendencies when even non-geek contesters see the benefits:

I like the term "neoluddite", is it TM Bob McGwier?

My reaction is that I want the system to support as many
receivers/transmitters/bandscopes as are reasonably possible for it to
support. To me, it doesn't make sense to use 10% of the FPGA capacity
to reproduce the functions of a typical 1970's radio, particularly
after some of the designers have gone out of their way to ensure that
the system has considerably more capacity than this. While I am
writing this, in the background I have a copy of Alex, VE3NEA's
Skimmer Server running. It allows you to "watch" the CW portion of up
to seven bands at once, and see all of the active callsigns in
realtime. While it uses the QS1R, I believe the ADC and FPGA hardware
are identical if not similar to those in the Mercury.  This is the
kind of application that was never possible prior to the arrival of
HPSDR technology, and I think we should encourage the development of
more new uses like this one, in addition to the "classical"
applications.

I was thinking about the topic of "marketing" HPSDR that was discussed
a few weeks ago during the TeamSpeak session: I wondered if anyone had
considered the topic of meta-design? By meta-design, I mean that given
the diverse and divergent interests of everyone in the HPSDR group, we
should understand that there is no one single design that will satisfy
everyone's purposes (use cases), and we owe it to ourselves to make
sure that the system design can accommodate the widest possible range
of uses, even ones that nobody has yet conceived, and that means that
the hardware/FPGA designs need to be as modular and flexible as
possible.

-- 
Larry Gadallah, VE6VQ/W7                          lgadallah AT gmail DOT com
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