[hpsdr] SDR Architectures

[Sid Boyce]

The still born Project Athena was announced here a long time ago with 
exactly that goal in mind.

The only project that has come close in terms of the number of SDR 
hardware platforms supported is ghpsdr3-alex using Qt/C++.

Having said that I have not seen other than QtRadio running on Windows 
and the full suite on Linux  though written in Qt/C++, both which are 
cross platform development tools it should be possible to build and run 
ghpsdr3-alex on any operating system and hardware platform including 
OSX. For any new SDR that emerges, a plugin can be written.

Helmut's cuSDR is the bright light as far as openHPSDR hardware is 
concerned, though every time I think I am getting it built on ARM I run 
into a single problem with qreal, double and float specifications but I 
am determined to find a solution to get it built.

There are some nice and capable very small ARM 32-bit multi-core CPU/GPU 
boards out there and soon it's hoped we will see ARM 64-bit boards 
sprouting up.

I have no problems running ghpsdr3-alex with Hermes + eb104.ru BPF and 
300W PA/LPF, thanks to Andrea Montefusco who only yesterday provided the 
filter switching software implementing Hermes open collector support on 
J16. A number of other non-openHPSDR programs running on ODROID-X and 
Parallella-16 - support for HPSDR(including Hermes/ANAN), Softrock, 
UHFSDR, Microtelecom Perseus, SDR-iq, HiQSDR, Ettus Research USRP and 
rtl-sdr DVB-T dongles.

The new tiny ODROID-U3 quad core 1.2 GHz/2GB board is only $59 and would 
be my preferred board if I didn't already have the -X.
These boards are more than powerful enough to natively build and run 
large suites like gnuradio on.

We need a rethink of software and hardware platforms - standing still is 
to be left behind in the fast paced era we are in, losing out on the 
possibilities begging to be taken up. ARM and FPGA is making inroads 
even in large datacentres, IBM and others are introducing them into the 
mix as it provides powerful yet power efficient bespoke solutions.
73 ... Sid.

-- 
Sid Boyce ... Hamradio License G3VBV, Licensed Private Pilot
Emeritus IBM/Amdahl Mainframes and Sun/Fujitsu Servers Tech Support
Senior Staff Specialist, Cricket Coach
Microsoft Windows Free Zone - Linux used for all Computing Tasks


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