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Hi All,<br>
<br>
I am convinced that the $900 news isn't as bad as you all think.
Hermes will be released as NCL at least, which means that it can be
duplicated on a small scale by anyone who wishes to. TAPR has said
there will be circuit boards available, and Phil was selling
prototypes for the reasonable price of $40 each, which is about what
the other boards from TAPR cost. I have the BOM, and while I
haven't priced everything out, nobody else who has will share this
information, and Scotty is now running a for profit business to sell
Hermes. He has to make money to make his business run and if
everyone knew what it cost Scotty, it would make some unhappy. In
the past, Scotty has donated thousands of hours to the HPSDR
projects, and he deserves some payback, if he desires or needs it.
I bet you can build you own Hermes board for less than half Scotty's
price, and if you ask for Engineering Samples, even a whole lot
less. It is actually very easy to build surface mount boards like
this, even easier than through hole boards, by using a solder
stencil, paste, and an ordinary toaster oven. See for example our
video on building the Softrock_40_R <a
href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0FHvikd3BkY">here</a> and <a
href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCWVUdBO0kg&feature=relate">here</a>.
I could probably make some solder stencils and those who want to
build their boards could mail them to the next person in line.<br>
<br>
So, if you are willing to do a little home brew, like the
developers, you too can have a Hermes for a price that is much
closer to what Kevin and the others who started this project
envisioned.<br>
<br>
73,<br>
<br>
Rob<br>
KL7NA<br>
<br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
Rob Frohne, Ph.D., P.E.
E.F. Cross School of Engineering
Walla Walla University
100 SW 4th Street
College Place, WA 99324
(509) 527-2075 <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://people.wallawalla.edu/%7Erob.frohne">http://people.wallawalla.edu/~rob.frohne</a>
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