AmateurRadio.com

I’ve discovered an archive of several older electronics and radio-related magazines available for download in PDF format.

http://www.americanradiohistory.com/Popular-Electronics-Guide.htm

In addition to Popular Electronics, they also have archives of the following titles available:

Electronics Illustrated (1958-1972)
Electronics World (1959-1972)
Radio Electronics (1948-1992)
Elementary Electronics (1964-1980 sporadic)
BYTE (1975-1984)

And many more….

A post I read online today reminded me of something. Last week a friend’s XYL ask me for some good Christmas stocking stuffer ideas for her husband. I drew a blank! I didn’t have a good answer for her.

Mugs? Vehicle decals? T-shirts? That was about the best I could come up with on short notice.

So, what under-$30 ham-related items would you like to see in your Christmas stocking this year? Leave your answers in the comments and we’ll have a list of good ideas!

Here’s what I’ve come up with so far…

Laser Engraved Ham Radio Callsign Plaque

This is a pretty unique idea. They take your ham license details and put it into a template. Then they laser off the metal lacquer leaving shiny metallic writing underneath and mount it on a oak plaque.– $22.99 from HamCrazy.com

Carved Oak Call Sign

Another unique gift idea, this is a beautifully crafted 3-D version of your call sign. Available in several different varieties of wood.— $4 per letter on k7bon.com

Engraved Brass Plate for the Elecraft K3

Granted, we’re all not lucky enough to own an Elecraft K3. But if you do, here’s a beautiful way to let everyone know who assembled it!— $5.50 from Arkay Engravers Associates

Please don’t forget the awesome t-shirt designs offered by our sponsors, HamShirts.com and Hip Ham Shirts! They always make great gifts — who couldn’t use another t-shirt?!

Bill Harrison, KK4JPT, has announced that Hardened Power Systems has launched an online campaign to fund the rebuilding of their business.

On Halloween, the company suffered a devastating fire resulting in the loss of their manufacturing facility.

Hardened Power Systems manufactures several popular ham radio products including the D-HAP and JuiceBox.

Here is where you come in, we need your financial commitment to begin the process of rebuilding this business. We are determined to remain faithful to our commitment of quality, durability, and cost effectiveness. The process of rebuilding will take time and we are prepared for the journey ahead, but to expedite this process we need your support. In return we will make a promise to compensate you for your gift with limited editions of some of our gear to commemorate this event.

From their website:

Airspy is an advanced software defined radio receiver capable of sampling 10MHz of spectrum anywhere between 24MHz and 1.7GHz – and even beyond with extensions. It all started when we needed a good performing receiver that’s still affordable but could not find a good solution in the market, so we designed ours. We believe that as of today, Airspy is the only serious wide band receiver solution that’s high performance and yet affordable.

Some specs:

• Continuous 24 – 1750 MHz RX range with no gaps
• 3.5 dB NF between 42 and 1002 MHz
• Tracking RF filters
• 35dBm IIP3 RF front end
• 12bit ADC @ 20 MSPS (80dB Dynamic Range, 64dB SNR, 10.4 ENOB) – Yeah, size does matter.
• Up to 80 MSPS for custom applications
• Cortex M4F @ up to 204MHz with Multi Core support (dual M0)
• 1.5 ppm high precision, low phase noise clock
• 1 RTC clock (for packet time-stamping)
• External clock input (10 MHz to 100 MHz via MCX connector) – Ideal for phase coherent radios
• 10 MHz panoramic spectrum view with 9MHz alias/image free
• IQ or Real, 16bit fixed or 32bit float output streams
• No IQ imbalance, DC offset or 1/F noise at the center of the spectrum that plagues all the other SDRs
• Extension ports: 16 x SGPIO
• 1 x RF Input (SMA)
• 1 x RF Output (Loopthrough, U-FL)
• 2 x High Speed ADC inputs (up to 80 MSPS, U-FL)
• 4.5v software switched Bias-Tee to power LNA’s and up/down-converters

Thoughts:

From what I’ve read, the big advantage of this over a standard RTL-SDR dongle is much less noise. I haven’t used one, but if it really lives up to their claims the $199 price point is actually pretty reasonable.

http://www.airspy.com / $199

The interwebs are abuzz with reports that the latest Windows update is killing counterfeit FTDI chips. Future Technology Devices International (FTDI) — according to Wikipedia — “develops, manufactures, and supports devices and their related software drivers for converting RS-232 or TTL serial transmissions to USB signals, in order to allow support for legacy devices with modern computers.”

The latest Windows update includes a new driver that is apparently “bricking” the knock-off FTDI FT232 chips by programming the USB PID to zero. This causes the device containing the chip to become inaccessible on any operating system. After the PID reset, apparently the programming cable itself will be rendered inoperable even on a non-Windows computer running Mac OS or Linux.

What might you have around the shack that could contain a counterfeit FTDI chip? Well, lots of things including that cheap USB radio programming cable you picked up on eBay. It’s not yet clear whether the affected FTDI chips are in any widely distributed radio programming cables.

While many radio programming cables advertise that they contain genuine FTDI chips, a post earlier this year on Hackaday shows that it’s not always easy to tell a fake from the real thing. One difference, apparently, is that the markings are laser etched on the genuine chip are often just printed onto the fakes.

If you experience a “bricked” cable due to this update, please report your experience in the comments including any details about the cable you were using.

What exactly is “zero distance communication”?