Thanks to Rogier PA1ZZ for sending me this YouTube link. It is a truly wonderful channel from Spain. Not only the Collins Gold Dust Twins, but also lots of great (and not-so-great!) older receivers. SP-600s, S-38s, Rhode and Schwartz rigs, lots of great stuff. Go to the "Videos" link and enjoy the Thermatron goodness. Thanks Rogier! And thanks Fernando!
The aticle and the podcast (don't worry, it is NOT an AI podcast) explain how we were able to generate the AI podcasts we presented during the last two days.
https://www.theverge.com/24249388/notebooklm-google-steven-johnson-vergecast
The audio podcast feature was introduced only ONE WEEK AGO! Rarely have we been so close to the cutting edge!
The product itself first launched in 2023 as Project Tailwind, and has since been rebranded and expanded in big ways. Just last week, the team launched Audio Overviews, which generates a podcast — with two chatty hosts, plenty of back and forth, and a truly remarkable penchant for the phrases “deep dive” and “buckle up” — based on the information you provide. It’s fascinating, it’s complicated, and it’s getting better really fast.
Thanks to Bob for alerting me to all this!
Click here for the second "About SolderSmoke" podcast.
http://www.soldersmoke.com/About SolderSmoke 2.mp3
This one looks not at the SolderSmoke Daily News blog, but instead at the SolderSmoke podcast itself.
I was delighted to see the inclusion of Pete, Dean, Farhan and Mike Rainey! This was really great.
Look, it is not perfect. There are errors. But probably about the same number of errors that you would get from real, human hosts, right? Voltaire told us not to let the perfect be the enemy of the good. And I find this to be amazingly good. Look, it is so good that it is kind of scary, right?
Before you get too critical realize how this has been done: I did nothing more than load the SolderSmoke Podcast Archive website into GPT-like model. Then I asked it to produce a deep dive podcast. That's it. About 5 clicks. It developed the podcast in about 3 minutes. I did the same thing yesterday but with the SolderSmoke blog. And this is only the beginning.
Michael AG5VG finished this receiver last weekend. He hopes to build a CW transmitter using an output of the Si5351. Obviously I defer to Pete on that one. Good going Michael. I think it sounds great and looks even better.
A question this morning from Scott KQ4AOP caused me to Google this old book On page 59 I found the article about my first transmitter. Someone has put a copy of the entire book on the interenet. Here it is:
As an analog, HDR, discrete component, radical homebrew fundamentalist, obviously I have been concerned about all the hype about SDR. SDR advocates often make it sound as if those of us who build with discrete analog components (crystal filters!) are hopless troglodytes, about to be thrown on the ash heap of radio history. Or something like that. They sort of imply that without the cleansing benefits of SDR, our signals will remain hoplessly dirty.
I find it interesting that Sherwood concluded that the cleanest transmitter he ever owned was a Collins 32S-3! He compared the two tone output of this old rig to that of a modern transceiver. This was in 2019. See above. HDR wins.
Don't get me wrong. I want to clean up the signals from my HDR rigs. But I am encouraged by Sherwood's remarks. I do not think I will have to go SDR in order to have a clean signal. I may just do some two-tone tests on the rigs, make some adjustments, and maybe build a class A Thermatron .1 kW linear.
Here is a good (and very recent) article on IMD ("splatter") produced in transmitters. The focus is on VHF, but much of this is relevant to HF operators. I found the footnotes on the ARRL "Clean Signal Initiative" to be worrisome. They seem to just be assuming that all ham operators will be using commercial gear, and the "OEM" needs to be made to meet certain standards. This seems to leave the homebrewer out in the cold. I can see where someday soon, the "standards" will exceed the capability of analog homebrewers. That would be bad.
The role that signal strength plays in the perception of "splatter" is often misunderstood by the "waterfall police." We often we hear some irate waterfall policeman screaming that, "You are 40 over and far too wide." Here is a good quote from the article on this point:
"If you have a calibrated spectrum display (as many SDR’s are these days), you can directly measure the level difference in dB. If it is 30 dB or more, then it could be an acceptably “clean signal”, even if it is bothersome. Most ham voice communication is conducted with less than 30 dB signal/noise, and in that case the unwanted IMD is buried in the noise."
And even in a low noise environment, if the signal is 40 db over S9. that would mean the signal PEP is at -33dbm. If the IMD products are 46 db down from the signal peak, that means your IMD products are -79 dbm. That is S-8! That signal will look quite wide in the waterfall, but it would be within FCC specs, right? The problem here is not so much distortion, as signal strength. And let's remember that "legal limit" is usually a misnomer: FCC regs require hams to use the minimum power necessary, not 1.5 kW on every single QSO.
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