SBS-1 ETHERNET VERSION UPDATE

[SabreJV]

Andy

(apologies for off topic) as you posted the picture link to the internals of the SBS.

Do you or does anyone know what the internal blue/green flashing led roughly in the middle of the board is indicating or its purpose.

cheers
Sabrejv

[Faramir]

Andy

(apologies for off topic) as you posted the picture link to the internals of the SBS.

Do you or does anyone know what the internal blue/green flashing led roughly in the middle of the board is indicating or its purpose.

cheers
Sabrejv

Actually, there are two LED,s. One is blue and the other one is green. It is the green that is flashing. They're mounted behind each other. And I also wonder what it means

cheers,
Faramir

[SabreJV]

Faramir - Thanks for the clarification, not wishing to take the SBS apart I was only looking through the front panel, and its not that clear what's going on in there

Sabrejv

[Faramir]

Faramir - Thanks for the clarification, not wishing to take the SBS apart I was only looking through the front panel, and its not that clear what's going on in there

Sabrejv

I also looked through the front panel. Try to look more diagonally inside from the left. You'll see the green LED behind the blue one. I feel comforted that I'm not the only one who's curious about what's going on in that neet little box. Indeed, curious as I am, I won't open the unit!

Faramir

[chrisw]

would it be possible to use a computer directly connected to the sbs to transmit the data over a wireless home network to another computer running the basestation?

Surely using PC Anywhere, this would be possible - just run Basestation on the PC connected to the SBS and watch and control it from the remote PC. (Or am I being thick???)

[hbervoets]

from http://www.tech-software.net

does not explains what the "inside LEDs" are meaning but nice anyway.



1 - BNC -Connector
2 - Helix-Filter
3 - Preamp
4 - Helix-Filter
5 - Mixer
6 - LT1963 1.5A, Low Noise, Fast Transient Response LDO Regulators
7 - LEDs airplane activity
8 - 40 MHz crystal
9 - LED update SRAM memory
10 - LED link SBS-PC active
11 - asynchronous SRAM memory
12 - LED USB link
13 - LED Power on
14 - LT1086 1.5A Low Dropout Positive Regulators Adjustable and Fixed 2.85V, 3.3V, 3.6V, 5V, 12V
15 - MAX 3232 RS232-Transceiver
16 - RS232 Connector
17 - Power connector 5V 350 mA
18 - 6 MHz crystal
19 - Xilinx FPGA Spartan XC3S400 with 400kB system gates, 58 kB RAM, 288 kB BlockRAM
20 - USB connector
21 - Dual USB/FIFO FTT2232C
22 - 74HC1250
23 - AD9203 10-Bit-A/D-Converter 40 M/s
24 - XCF 025 PLD

Taken and translated from a German magazine elektronik industrie 11/2005 page 85

[phoutman]

I'm answering my own question now (to chrisw) - i think i've got a clearer idea of the situation:
yes, you can use pcanywhere etc (i have used logmein.com) to connect remotely to a computer screen running basestation, but this is different to getting access to the actual data stream (usb from the box) - this is more complicated - the new "wireless usb" (wusb/cablefree/etc) devices may do the trick, but not ordinary wireless network devices available for many years.
hope that is a reasonable summary of the situation - please let me know if the situation has changed (still looking forward to an ethernet SBS)

[G0RMA]

A thought occured, and probably more important, if we had ethernet access to our SBS data, there would be no embargo on a self run Mapmode S option.
As I am sure this would allow us all to update a server with data.

[DaveReid]

A thought occured, and probably more important, if we had ethernet access to our SBS data, there would be no embargo on a self run Mapmode S option.
As I am sure this would allow us all to update a server with data.

Everyone already has Ethernet (more specifically TCP/IP) access to their own SBS data.

That's what servers like NetModeS and OpenATC use.

Dave

[skyscraper]

Since a week i am using the SBS1. It works great, high tech innovation.
However i have to make a compromise between a 10meter long aerial cable or a USB extender cable. Both i don't like.
Ethernet could be the solution. So i wanted to make a adaption to the SBS1 box with an xport of lantronix, to bypass the USB chip and work over TCP/IP. After opening i saw that everything is prepaired for insertion of a Digi Connect ME tcp/ip module. (same as xport of lantronix).
Even the connectorhole was made but hided by a Kinetics sticker.

I investigated: if the module is placed i think i have to use an external supply because USB can't deliver the power.
I'm at the point of placing the Digi connect ME module and soldering it.
Can someone tell if there are some jumpers to be set?
Is it so easy as I think?
Is the external voltage between 5 and 12 V max. 500mA OK?

Greetings Henk

[bones]

Early SBS boxes came with a main power lead and were 5V, 2.5A output.

Later boxes come without a mains power unit and are 12V.

I suspect that more than a few users would be very interested if this could work..

[threemiles]

The SBS data stream is encrypted, so there is two things to be observed:

- A TCP stream could only be used together with Basestation. You need a driver that captures the USB in/output of Basestation and redirects it to the TCP/IP stack, also an outbound connection (seen from the PC) is required so the encryption can be set up

- on the SBS side the xport serial input format/speed etc. must be identical to the FT232 serial input, everything else would require a reprogram of the FPGA

[skyscraper]

@threemiles,
The TCP/IP socket and encryption is already in the basestation software if first install is done. On port 20060 you can connect the SBS1.
I did try it, and got the message that no valid radar packets were received within 60 seconds from SBS1, so this cannot be a problem.
A 16 byte packet was send from the PC basestation software.
(communicated to a stand alone server, the one in my SBS1 is not yet working).

The baudrate could be a problem. The USB baudrate is 921600, max baudrate of the digi connect ME module is 230400.
Could there be an auto baud detect?

@everyone,
Soldered the ethernet connector/server on the SBS1 board.
Everything stayed working so no smoke or light emitting resistors.
The only thing i discovered that the reset line to the module stays low.
This line comes from pin21 of the xilinx spartan and without a clue from somebody (kinetics innovators?) i don't think i can open communication. Randomly selecting jumpers i don't like, because i don't want to lose my perfect virtual radar tool.

@kinetics,
Please could you give me a clue, how to open communications.
Do i need to set a jumper?
Do i need to do a setup via USB?
Do i need a beta version firmware software?
anything else?

Regards from Henk

[threemiles]

Afair the ethernet option is removed from the current Basestation software. When you search through the forum posts you will find good reasons why Kinetic will not answer your requests to support the Ethernet functions.

Cheers
3NM

[Faramir]

To simply not answer questions about this I still consider rude. A simple TCP (connection) based session makes a one-on-one coupling possible, when encrypted yet even easier. I therefore cannot think of a good reason to simply ignore questions about the Ethernet option from a paying customer.