The Teensy boards[0] are the work of a single, dedicated engineer. While their design is proprietary, they are compatible with the Arduino IDE, to which Paul Stoffregen (PJ from PJRC) contributes substantially[1]. Unlike both Arduino entities[2, 3], his track record is clear from ethical shenanigans.
Looks cool, hate to look a gift horse in a mouth. Can I get a part list/build plans for the HW side. This might be what actually gets me into playing with SDR. :)
Hi, I made the Etch-A-SDR. Found this thread after seeing the stars on the Github project jump (Thanks HN!).
The hardware used is:
- Acrylic sheet
- Odroid C1 (There are more powerful Odroids now, either the C2 [0] or XU4 [1])
- RTL-SDR
- GY-521 6DOF
- Teensy 3.1
- Rotary Encoders (adafruit)
- Push buttons (adafruit)
- 10.1" TFT screen with speakers (adafruit)
- Ethernet / USB bulkheads (adafruit)
- MCX to SMA bulkhead (ebay)
- misc parts ( screws, stand-offs, etc from home depot)
- Knobs from a real Etch-a-Sketch
I presented this at the monthly Cyberspectrum SDR Meetup [2] in San Francisco, the slides, which include pictures of inside the Etch-A-SDR, and an overview of the hardware/software can be seen here [3], and a live stream recording here [4].
If you're just getting started with SDR, I would suggest setting it up on regular computer vs starting with running it on an ARM type board, SDR is very resource hungry, and runs better on a normal machine. There is a big community over at the r/rtlsdr [5] subreddit. SDR is a lot of fun, and opens up the huge world of RF, and it is very inexpensive to get started.
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0. https://www.pjrc.com/teensy/index.html
1. http://www.pjrc.com/teensy/arduino_contrib.html
2. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11212021
3. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9231708