Many thanks to Jim Veatch (WA2EUJ) who shares the following:
HobbyPCB is offering their RS-HFIQ 5W SDR on Kickstarter starting at $239. Check it out here:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/hobbypcb/rs-hfiq-5w-software-defined-radio-sdr-tranceiver
Thanks, Jim-I wish you success in this campaign (though it appears you’ve met your base goal and are now into stretch goals).
While there are a fair amount of SDRs in the $200-300 price range, there are few that are actually transceivers. I’m also impressed with the level of filtering on both the RX and TX stages and the fact that the baseband and digital section have separate and isolated grounds. The RS-HFIQ could potentially have a low noise floor and a decent front end.
If you back the RS-HFIQ, please consider sending us your review to publish here on the SWLing Post!
Does it support 11 meters? I need one radio to rule them all.
One of the challenges with these projects is that they aim to produce the bare board, not a true usable radio. if successful, you have to engineer your own box and knobs and controls, your own power supply, sometimes your own display. So these project seem to produce not a “ready to go” radio but instead only the elements of a new project. Currently several similar projects out there have already produced very good qrp transceivers by specs but they are not consumer ready – they are geared to someone who will pick it up and complete the work with an enclosure, display and power supply.
Good point, Ivan!
Not to overlook the software, you will need the source code, editor, compiler and emulator for the target MCU/DSP and a full understanding of Windowing GUIs (graphical user interfaces) writing code in a suitable high level lnguage, Maxwell’s laws and embedding them in FFT algorithms and skills at debugging code.