RE: [linrad] RE frequency control

[W3SZ <w3sz@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

HI, Dan!

That is a great idea!  Then essentially any piece of gear hooked to any
computer that is connected to the Linrad machine by a serial port can be
controlled.

It means that I could control my FT-1000 or Elecraft K2 from Linrad
without disconnecting them from their Windows machines.  That is very
nice.  And it really makes Linrad work like a transceiver ;)

Since both the PTS synthesizer and the FT1000 would be connected to the
Linrad box, Linrad would be able to take into account the LO frequency
of the PTS synthesizer as well as its own frequency readout to keep the
FT1000 transmitter on the Linrad receive frequency even when the LO
changed to look at another segment of the band.  Very nice...now the
only question is will it be possible to figure it all out and actually
do it? ;)

Yes, the National Instruments boxes are very nice, and the models for
ISA or MCA (do I have that right?  I mean the dead-end bus that the
PS2's used) are sometimes on eBay for very reasonable prices.  I have a
bunch of PS2s hanging around here just in case I need to use the MCA
National Instruments GPIB boards I got.  I think the boards were $20 or
so, and the computers were $0-25.

Well I was up most of the night listening to the Leonids, so I think I
will get some rest now...

73,

Roger Rehr
W3SZ   FN20ah
2 Merrymount Road
Reading, PA  19609-1718
http://www.qsl.net/w3sz


> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-linrad@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
> [mailto:owner-linrad@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Dan Hammill
> Sent: Tuesday, November 19, 2002 2:13 AM
> To: linrad@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: RE: [linrad] RE; Dynamic range, and frequency control
> 
> 
> Hi Roger,
> 
> I have a suggestion re. using the NI GPIB in your WindBlowz 
> machine for auto-control with Linrad.  Treat the Microsoft 
> box with the NI card as a RS-232 controlled instrument by 
> writing a small VB or C app (or LabVIEW, or HP VEE, etc.) 
> that takes serial commands from the Linrad machine via 
> RS-232, then routes them to the signal generator via GPIB. Do 
> just the reverse if you want to get a response from the sig 
> gen with Linrad.  Same goes for any other I/O hardware that 
> works under Windoze but not under Linux.
> 
> I've actually done something very similar to this in my 
> professional life, and it worked very well.  The bad news is 
> that I was a good boy and didn't take the code home with me 
> when I left that company several years ago.  In retrospect, 
> that company no longer exists, but I still do, so I guess it 
> really wouldn't have mattered to anyone but me in the long run.
> 
> I also have a NI AT-GPIB board, so I guess there really is
> a good reason to keep my old ISA/PCI Pentium machines.
> 
> 73,
> Dan  KB5MY
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-linrad@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> [mailto:owner-linrad@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of W3SZ
> Sent: Monday, November 18, 2002 10:14
> To: linrad@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: [linrad] RE; Dynamic range, and frequency control
> 
> 
> 
> <snip>
> 
> Leif's hardware.c note means that those us of using PTS 
> synthesizers for our LO could now incorporate frequency 
> control of those into Linrad, instead of running a separate 
> control program.  However we would need to rewrite the 
> control section to use parallel port with PTS pinouts, or for 
> GPIB, or use serial to GPIB or serial to parallel converters. 
>  I have a National Inststruments GPIB board, but it is ISA 
> and for Windows and DOS, and so I can't use it directly with 
> Linrad.  I currently have it running on another computer and 
> just switch to that keyboard to QSY to another 96 KHz segment 
> of the band.
> 
> 
> 73,
> 
> Roger Rehr
> W3SZ   FN20ah
> 2 Merrymount Road
> Reading, PA  19609-1718
> http://www.qsl.net/w3sz
> 
> 



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