[hpsdr] Problems Running PowerSDR

[Mark Leone]

I'm still having problems getting most binary distros of PowerSDR 
running, but I did find one that works. Since a couple of these are 
called out specifically by HPSDR documentation as the version I should 
download, I'd like to know what I'm missing for the versions that don't 
work.. or maybe the one that works is the only one that's supposed to 
work for my configuration.

The HPSDR configuration I'm starting with is just Mercury and Metis. The 
OS is Windows7 64-bit. Here are the PowerSDR versions I tried 
(designated by SVN repo path) and the results for each.

1) ...kd5tfd/PennyMerge/Release (This is the version that the Mercury 
and PennyLane manuals and the PowerSDR Quickstart guide say to use)

The program throws an IOException on startup. It runs normally until I 
close the Windows error dialog, at which point PowerSDR crashes. Phil 
pointed out that I need to use the signed version of the USB dll files. 
So I downloaded the signed libs from the HPSDR downloads page and put 
libusb0_x64.dll in the same directory with PowerSDR.exe. I verified it 
is signed with a Verisign-issued cert, issued to Acquisition Logic. The 
IOException still occurs. I tried running with the 32-bit version of the 
signed libraries (in the PowerSDR directory and also using the 32-bit 
simulator in c:\Windows\SysWOW64), and also including the 32 and 64-bit 
libusb0.sys files. None of this fixes the IOException problem.

Using Microsoft's DependencyWalker propgram, I looked at the dependency 
resolution status of libusb0_x64.dll. There is a single unresolved 
dependency for ieframe.dll. The message is "Warning: At least one module 
has an unresolved import due to a missing export function in a 
delay-load dependent module." The only further info I can get out of the 
tool is that functions 160, 141, and 159 are missing. I don't know what 
dll file may be missing. I searched the Internet and couldn't find a 
64-bit version of ieframe.dll; so I'm using a 32-bit version in the 
SysWOW64 dir, which was already installed.

2) ...k6jca/bin/Release
     Same result as 1) above

3) ...W5WC/PowerSDR_HPSDR_2/bin/Release (This version is called out on 
the HPSDR Downloads Page)

I don't get the IOException on startup. The usb dll provided is 
libusb0.dll, and it's signed by "Bronze Bear Communications, Inc D/B/A 
FlexRadio Systems)". (I tried using this dll file in ditros 1) and 2) 
above, but it didn't help). Although the program starts up successfully, 
it doesn't work. There are no signals, and I think it's because it 
doesn't work with Metis. Although there are options to select Metis in 
the configuration, the Metis IP and Mac addresses are shown as all 
zeros, and the Firmware Version for Metis and Mercury is given as N/A.

4) ...W5WC/PowerSDR_HPSDR_1.19.3/bin/Release/bin/Release and 
...W5WC/Beta_Release/PowerSDR_1.19.3.5/bin/Release

An exception occurs on startup, with message "Cannot load 
JanusAudio.dll", even though this file is in the program directory, and 
permissions are good.

5) ...W5WC/Beta_Release/PowerSDR_Metis_Hermes/bin/Release

This one works. There is no startup exception because, being built 
specifically for Metis, there is no libusb0.dll file. Metis and Mercury 
firmware versions are shown, and there are signals.