Al,
Yours was an interesting reply to my question.
I have tried to reply to everyone personally off-line (to limit the SPAM
here) but I want to reply to yours on the reflector.
I hear you and can not argue against anything you say, other than the
definition of an SDR. It's hard to get a handle on what SDR really is.
There are several definitions out there and I like Doug's description of it.
Bottom line, the definition seems to be a bit gooie right now and the ORION
certainly fits within the bandwidth of the description(s) of SDR that I've
seen to-date.
I think we would all welcome radios that could accomodate new modes of
operation by simple firmware updates. I believe the ORION and the Jupiter
can.
Thanks for the response.
73
Rick
-----Original Message-----
From: tentec-bounces@contesting.com
[mailto:tentec-bounces@contesting.com]On Behalf Of al_lorona@agilent.com
Sent: Tuesday, June 08, 2004 12:55 PM
To: tentec@contesting.com
Subject: RE: [TenTec] Question for Contesters:
Lest anyone get the wrong idea, strictly speaking the Orion is not a
software-defined radio. I remember Scott at Ten Tec reiterating this
point here on the reflector during an early thread on the merits of
software-defined radios where too many folks were equating software
defined radios with the Orion. At the time I also searched everywhere on
the Ten Tec web site, and nowhere found the term "software-defined
radio". We should be very clear on whether we are lumping the Orion
(erroneously) into that broad category called "software-defined radio",
and if so, what exactly we mean by the term "software-defined radio". I
fear that it is quickly being diluted into a meaningless term.
Not every transceiver with DSP and softkeys and downloadable firmware
can be called "software defined". "Software defined" implies a lot of
flexibility that allows the radio to adapt to just about every
foreseeable signal that could possibly be conceived of. That almost
dictates that the architecture be one where the incoming RF is digitized
immediately after the antenna connector, and demodulation is
accomplished by software.
"Software-defined" means, among other things, that if a new mode called,
say, "Polar Modulation with a little PSK58 frequency hopping thrown in
for good measure"-- whatever this is-- is invented this afternoon at
4:00, that we will be able to download new firmware to demodulate this
new mode in our radio. Does this define the Orion? Maybe I'm wrong, but
I don't think necessarily so.
Al W6LX
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