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<p>Hi,</p>
I guess its time for me to enter the peanut gallery:<br>
<br>
Sell 2 variants of the board:<br>
<br>
1: bare board, bed-of-nail tested.<br>
This board would satisfy the hard-core DIY crowd.<br>
<br>
2: board with BGA FPGA installed, as well as all the large scale,
dense pinout chips.<br>
meaning the FPGA, the ADC(s), DAC and possibly 1 or 2 more.
If your bothering to<br>
set up the line, add ALL the difficult parts.<br>
This would be ideal for those wishing to DIY it, but accepting
the reality that these<br>
large-scale, dense pinout chips are better left to machines
designed for the task.<br>
I've worked these sorts of projects commercially for the "big
boys", and they don't<br>
even consider building/repairing this type of board by hand.
If it doesn't work it<br>
goes into the trash (except for possible postmortem info, or
salvaging very expensive parts)<br>
<br>
Probably not in scope but a high speed bus such as pciE would be
required if you want to do<br>
DFC work with it. 1Gbit ethernet wont cut it.<br>
<br>
Steve AD0ES<br>
<br>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 06/03/2017 12:43 PM, Steve Haynal
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:CAPmdav9-i6n6TUK6dC_o0i5tu9jRtVTn3v2rkPE7sas7maf8uw@mail.gmail.com">
<pre wrap="">***** High Performance Software Defined Radio Discussion List *****
</pre>
<br>
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<div dir="ltr">Hi Glen,
<div><br>
</div>
<div>This is a receiver only. 14-bit. You can listen to many
online at <a href="http://sdr.hu" moz-do-not-send="true">http://sdr.hu</a></div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>I mention it in context of the Hermes transceiver redesign
for these reasons.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>It uses a relatively inexpensive Xilinx Artix7 BGA part.
$35 for 35K LEs. Earlier discussion on this thread recommended
switching to BGA even though it restricts access to home
builders. Also, it was pointed out that pin and interfacing
specs are better for BGA and there are fewer new nonBGA FPGAs
available. With the Hermes-Lite 2 we went with a Cyclone IV
part in 144 EQFP package just so home builders would be able
to build one. We've learned that there is now too much SMT on
the Hermes-Lite 2 that only a few diehards will ever build one
at home. I anticipate that most Hermes-Lite 2s will be
partially or completely assembled in China. So in hindsight we
could have considered a BGA part for the Hermes-Lite 2, and I
probably will in future projects.<br>
</div>
</div>
</blockquote>
<br>
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