Anko streaming microphone - low cost, decent quality

One of the keys to getting the best out of digital voice over HF using FreeDV is having a good quality microphone fairly close to the speaker. Stephen, VK2BLQ, drew my attention to a "Streaming" microphone branded Anko and for sale in kmart and Target for AU$19.

It has a wire grill with a foam pop filter underneath it. There's a rather weird RGB led lighting effect that can be controlled by pushing the knob. The quality of the audio is surprisingly good! Until I looked closely at it I didn't realise it's also a USB output audio device with a 3.5mm socket under the main body.

USB Microphone:

  Location ID: 0x02122000

  Connection Type: Removable

  Manufacturer: USB Microphone

  Serial Number: Not Provided

  Link Speed: 12 Mb/s

  USB Vendor ID: 0x434c

  USB Product ID: 0x4155

  USB Product Version: 0x0100

The vendor ID isn't listed in the databases I could find and the main chip has it's numbers blanked out.

Inside it shows a nice large condenser microphone.

If you're looking for a USB microphone for very little money, I can recommend this one. I wish the mount at the bottom had the standard thread but otherwise I have no complaints.

Tech Talk on ABC Radio - Valve is coming for Microsoft's games

The global video games market is worth approximately $337 billion US, 10 times the size of the global movie business. Video games have gone through massive transitions.  

Valve, an American video game developer, publisher, and digital distribution company, suggests another transition is coming, and it doesn't look good for Microsoft.  

The cost of watching Australian content on all the commercial video streaming services and competition for satellite internet is coming to Australia.

Peter Marks, mobile software developer and technology commentator from Access Informatics, joined Philip Clark and listeners to Nightlife. https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/nightlife/nightlife-tech-talk-with-peter-marks/106025034

 

Power tool battery for QRP Radio

Bought one of these 12V power tool battery adapters.

It has an adjustable output voltage - handy for the QRP-Labs QMX which is rather sensitive to voltage. Noise on receive seems very low. The one I bought is for Makita 18V batteries and was AU$35 on Amazon. I can see versions for other batteries. Also available from AliExpress but the price difference isn't worth the wait.

It came with a cigarette lighter socket but obviously I've changed it to Anderson Powerpole.

Aurora visible in Victoria - excellent local conditions on 80m

We are experiencing a severe geomagnetic storm at the moment. The Macedon Radio club's 80m net noticed the strongest local signals in recent memory. Eric, VK3ED, suggested that I had bent his digital S meter. 

It was difficult to detect with the naked eye - I probably didn't stay out long enough for my eye to adapt - but phone cameras these days can pick up this sort of thing with a time exposure.

The colours shifted slowly over time with reds and greens.

Interesting that local 80m signals were big because the prediction of band conditions was not looking good.

(This is not live by the way).

FreeDV Australian net - 20 stations several new

A very successful FreeDV net this morning with 20 stations at least seen. Several new stations again this week which is great. Some of us were having audio problems, low level or clipping, difficulty controlling mic levels.

One user reported that the application crashed. After much deliberation, I've decided to move the net to 7045 rather than the frequency of 7177 built in to the app. 7177 is a slow scan TV frequency which I think was selected as there's not much activity. We've found in Australia that there's often SSB activity near this frequency. 7045 is in one of the ranges designated for digital modes. I've asked Mooneer to add 7045 to the app (you can add it yourself but I think it might be nice to have it built in). There is some ongoing discussion about this.

Stations seen this morning were: VK3TPM, VK3JF, VK3BRT, VK3SRC, VK3CKY, VK5KVA, VK5LN, VK7DBX, VK3KEZ, VK3GTP, VK3LRJ, VK5KFG, VK3SPX, VK3TFD, VK5HW, VK3KR, VK3JCO, VK3PCC, VK4WGR and VK2KNC.

I will be at the Rosebud Radiofest next Sunday, as might be a few others, so someone might need to step in as net controller.

A headless QMX with 3D printed case

I built a QMX kit a while back but made a mistake by soldering the 2x16 LCD display on the front of the display board rather than behind. It was fine when used without a case but today I thought I'd 3D print a rather nice case and found, not surprisingly, that it wouldn't fit.

My attempts at desoldering the long row of parallel pins ended in disaster with me damaging the board. I wondered if a QMX can operate without the display.

Happily it works without the display board and I'm using it via USB as a WSPR transceiver. It's a bit hard to tell if the long press on the left encoder has turned it on so I look for ttyACM0 to appear in dev.

I've written to QRP-Labs to ask about ordering a new display board. It's great that QRP-Labs has a link to quite a big list of 3D designs for their products. I have printed the QMX Case / Stand for my other unit and it works well.

Tech Talk on ABC Radio - browser wars and is an 8K TV worth while?

Two new wars have broken out on our computer desktops, after a period of relative stability in two common areas of desktop computing - web browsing and image editing. 

Also, is an 8K TV a worthwhile next upgrade? 

Peter Marks, mobile software developer and technology commentator from Access Informatics, joined Philip Clark and listeners to Nightlife with a comprehensive discussion.  https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/nightlife/nightlife-tech-talk-with-peter-marks/105971638 

Short of disk space, check what Arduino is using

My Mac has a 500GB hard disk. Last night I tried upgrading to 26.1RC and it ran out of space. Using DaisyDisk I was surprised to find that all the Arduino boards and libraries I've installed over the years have now come to almost 30GB.

In recent times my focus has shifted to Raspberry Pi PICO development either in MicroPython or their native C SDK via Visual Studio Code. I can even single step debug using the debug probe so it's a big step up from Arduino.

I remember having computers with 20MB hard disks. Amazing to be running low with 500GB now.