some advice if considering LP PAN, LP Bridge and your computer for K3 PSDR

[Brian Pepperdine]

My apologies for a bit of divergence.
This concerns implementation of LP PAN and LP Bridge with PSDR for the K3.
Old hat perhaps, now that the P3 product exists.

In my case, living in Canada, I was not really willing to consider a P3 at this time, with respect, as an Elecraft product.
We have 14% import GST tax as well as some high postage costs.
As well,  a larger monitor to be used is better for my personal vision situation.
Yes, I realize EU etc. has it worse re. obtaining a P3 as well.


Anyhow, the LP products are fine.
But if it was possible to go down bad roads getting them work, I took those roads :)

So, caveats if you want to use LP products and the accompanying PSDR, with your K3 (which IS wonderful):

-Do not use a USB hub serial connection. Most computers don't have a COMM port these days, so be sure you have or are willing to get
a computer with some PCI and PCIe slots to put a COMM serial card into.

-Similarly, I advice a PCI based sound card. Firewire devices will likely, possibly and probably only work IF you get a TI chipset based Firewire interface, which are much less common as plug-in cards or on-board Firewire in laptops. Certainly the device I had did not work with a non TI based Firewire card.

-Lastly, if you have an older K3, be prepared or able to do or willing to farm out the K3 IF I/0 modification. Yes, its only a resistor change, but for me the SMD caught me blind-sided and I messed up. I killed some board traces, killed the SMD JFET etc. Not pretty, not my finest moment, but first time it was.
I fixed this with good help from Elecraft support and put in some wire paths for the ruined traces and a leaded JFET.
(not an issue for K3s after a certain serial number..). Afterward, of course I found some ideas on doing this better from Don Wilhelm. Such is fate.

Otherwise, now it all works very well. I am going to have good fun with this now.

73
Brien
VE3VAW
Toronto ON
     
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[Tony Estep]

On Fri, Sep 30, 2011 at 9:34 AM, Brian Pepperdine <
[hidden email]> wrote:

> ....implementation of LP PAN and LP Bridge with PSDR for the K3....<http://www.qsl.net/donate.html>

=============
Brian is right, it can be a little frustrating to get LP-Pan going with the
K3. However, when it's all up and running, the combination is excellent. You
have a really neat SDR Pan display, and you can tune both VFOs with a mouse
click, or drag a signal into the receiving window.  You get the nice
features of an SDR with the even nicer features of the K3's hardware.

73,
Tony KT0NY

--
http://www.isb.edu/faculty/facultydir.aspx?ddlFaculty=352
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[wc1m]

I use a USB hub serial connection (two 8-port ByteRunner USB-to-serial
interfaces for a total of 16 ports!) for both of my K3s and have no problems
using LP-PAN, PSDR, etc. I also use an external USB sound card (the
recommended EMU-0200) and that works fine as well. I think it depends on
which brands you select, how old your computer BIOS is and how old your copy
of Windows is. YMMV.

I was able to do the resistor mod in the one radio I have that needed, but I
can see where others might not want to do it. I'm not real fond of working
with SMD either.

73, Dick WC1M

-----Original Message-----
From: Brian Pepperdine [mailto:[hidden email]]
Sent: Friday, September 30, 2011 10:34 AM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: [Elecraft] some advice if considering LP PAN, LP Bridge and your
computer for K3 PSDR


My apologies for a bit of divergence.
This concerns implementation of LP PAN and LP Bridge with PSDR for the K3.
Old hat perhaps, now that the P3 product exists.

In my case, living in Canada, I was not really willing to consider a P3 at
this time, with respect, as an Elecraft product.
We have 14% import GST tax as well as some high postage costs.
As well,  a larger monitor to be used is better for my personal vision
situation.
Yes, I realize EU etc. has it worse re. obtaining a P3 as well.


Anyhow, the LP products are fine.
But if it was possible to go down bad roads getting them work, I took those
roads :)

So, caveats if you want to use LP products and the accompanying PSDR, with
your K3 (which IS wonderful):

-Do not use a USB hub serial connection. Most computers don't have a COMM
port these days, so be sure you have or are willing to get
a computer with some PCI and PCIe slots to put a COMM serial card into.

-Similarly, I advice a PCI based sound card. Firewire devices will likely,
possibly and probably only work IF you get a TI chipset based Firewire
interface, which are much less common as plug-in cards or on-board Firewire
in laptops. Certainly the device I had did not work with a non TI based
Firewire card.

-Lastly, if you have an older K3, be prepared or able to do or willing to
farm out the K3 IF I/0 modification. Yes, its only a resistor change, but
for me the SMD caught me blind-sided and I messed up. I killed some board
traces, killed the SMD JFET etc. Not pretty, not my finest moment, but first
time it was.
I fixed this with good help from Elecraft support and put in some wire paths
for the ruined traces and a leaded JFET.
(not an issue for K3s after a certain serial number..). Afterward, of course
I found some ideas on doing this better from Don Wilhelm. Such is fate.

Otherwise, now it all works very well. I am going to have good fun with this
now.

73
Brien
VE3VAW
Toronto ON
     

______________________________________________________________
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Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
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Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html