First things first with a bit of info on the world of other electronic news. Bill, N2CQR and Dean, KK4DAS have hit beyond the mark with their SolderSmoke Direct Conversion Receiver Project as "proof of life" units have been seen around the world. In a biblical sense, they have taught hams how to fish. Bravo guys!
Every venture has a starting place and their DCR is a great vehicle to begin that journey. With a successful project the quest begins for bigger and better and that opens the door to the universe. (Like may be a HB SDR which is nothing more than two DCR's in Quadrature.)
Well, I now have a Raspberry Pi5 working on the homebrew, SDR transceiver. It was not plug and play and a few hiccups along the way.
Generically the problems were mechanical and software. The RPi5 needs 5.1 VDC at 5 amps which in simple terms means you need a heat sink -- with a fan.
If you follow the 40-pin header at the top of the RPi5 and just behind the top two USB ports you see a small white socket. Now look at the fan connector mounted on the heat sink -- that jewel plugs into that socket. With the fan/heatsink installed not easy to get tab A installed in slot B especially if you suffer from FFS. On turn on the fan didn't work! But the heatsink alone while warm to slightly hot was good enough to load the software.
To make a long story short when I installed the plug, I evidently pushed one of the boards pins out of the way and so no contact. The fan has four wires with two to control the voltage and two to regulate the fan speed. Long story but a cascade of events resulted in pulling the board mounted socket off the pads and no easy way to reattach. Then I cut the plug off of the fan and attempted and action similar to the Mary Jo maneuver in the back seat of the 57 VW Beetle. Mostly blind and unable to reach some very critical parts. I was unable to get all four wires soldered to the teeny tiny pads. Next trick --simply supply the voltage pins. I did that off board and 5 Volts made it run. Thus, I was able to hard wire the voltage wires to the pads and it looks like hell but now have fan cooling.
It's Like Mary Jo in the back seat of the 57VW
One Step Up From a DCR
Optimal Shop $15 Sound Card!
I don't want to seem like sour grapes, but the fan connector is a weak point of the R Pi 5 board.
On to the software. When you load the OS to the SD card you can opt for 32 Bit or 64 Bit. Inherently the RPi 5 is a 64-Bit machine. I started with the 64-Bit OS, but I was unable to get QUISK to work and as the Doors would say was unable to "Light My Fire". Then I tried the 32-Bit OS and that was successful. I cloned that SD Card and later will go back and attempt the 64-Bit OS. It is a good idea to keep a copy of what works.
Some bonus stuff with the RPi 5 -- Netflix and Prime can be watched with no glitches so when the bands are dead you can watch Season 3 of "Reacher". If you have You Tube TV given Netflix and Prime work, that should too. Kind of amazing what you can get for $70.
Them that know can make it go.
73's
Pete N6QW