Thetis v2.9.0 - Updates and Issues

[ramdor]

ah no worries I didn't know either, or my bro, who is also a dev. (can't get him involved in radio or c#... sigh). There are work arounds in that linked doc.

Richie.

[rbduck]

This normal with the installer. There are files that appear being accessed by the system. The installer will either kill the process and continue or force a reboot.

I was surprised, Ruben. In eight or so years I've never once installed PowerSDR or Thetis and got a message a reboot was necessary.

Me too Scott. I have installed, reinstalled Thetis a good number of times in the past three years. I've not seen this or anything similar. This time I did get a similar message. I was a little different. I received a message stating that system files needed updating. It stated that I could let the installer stop the files and continue by choosing "YES" or by choosing "NO" the installer will cause a reboot and then continue with the install. I didn't think anything of it because I see this message quite often when installing or updating other software. Thetis updated quickly and is running well. I'm assuming that most everyone else is not seeing this? Strange,

[ramdor]

I did. It is probably VC143 (C++ 14.3 runtime) being installed as part of this version or the WiX installer needing to do something. Doug may know, but I do not have any experience of the WiX installer tbh.

Richie.

[w2ner]

Well, like always Richie, great work and many thanks!! It would be great to see an analog type meter like the one in the Sunsdr.

[ramdor]

Well, like always Richie, great work and many thanks!! It would be great to see an analog type meter like the one in the Sunsdr.

yep, I will be returning to working on the meter stuff at some point next week. Just sorting a few bugs, and generally letting things settle.

Richie.

[ramdor]

100D users. Do you have, or have you seen this issue? https://github.com/ramdor/Thetis-2.9.0/issues/14

Richie.

[K1LSB]

Well, like always Richie, great work and many thanks!! It would be great to see an analog type meter like the one in the Sunsdr.

I really like SDR Console's three-needle meter option (Peak, Instant and Noise floor).

Mark

[oe3ide]

Well, like always Richie, great work and many thanks!! It would be great to see an analog type meter like the one in the Sunsdr.

I really like SDR Console's three-needle meter option (Peak, Instant and Noise floor).

Mark

Yes it looks nice, but takes a lot of space if not placed into spectrum/waterfall.
I would prefer the S-Meter in the VFO-A/B "boxes", decoupled from all the tx-related meters.

73 Ernst

[K1LSB]

Well, like always Richie, great work and many thanks!! It would be great to see an analog type meter like the one in the Sunsdr.

I really like SDR Console's three-needle meter option (Peak, Instant and Noise floor).

Mark

Yes it looks nice, but takes a lot of space if not placed into spectrum/waterfall.
I would prefer the S-Meter in the VFO-A/B "boxes", decoupled from all the tx-related meters.

73 Ernst

I'm not so concerned about looking nice, I like the amount of information conveyed in a single meter.

Mark

Edit: And the meter size is adjustable in SDR Console.

[w-u-2-o]

Well, like always Richie, great work and many thanks!! It would be great to see an analog type meter like the one in the Sunsdr.

I really like SDR Console's three-needle meter option (Peak, Instant and Noise floor).

Mark

It might be worth pointing out that all of the raw material is there already in the existing Edge and Original meter types. Both already effectively show two pointers: current reading and historical. This could be modified to be peak and average, and a new meter selection, perhaps call it "Sig Combo", selected.

As for displaying noise level, the raw material is there for that as well. The measured noise value as determined by the auto AGC gain function could simply be mathematically adjusted to represent the total noise in the passband bandwidth, then displayed with either a third pointer or maybe just shown as a value in the corner of the meter. It might also be useful to display SNR in a separate corner of the meter. At the end of the day it's really SNR that matters, but that idea has really trickled into the mainstream yet except perhaps for those involved with digital modes.

[KA5KKT]

VAC on AM and SAM - When running in most modes via VAC and switching to AM or SAM, the VAC becomes unselected and audio stops. Reselecting VAC brings the audio back. This is not necessarily a 2.9.0 issue...been going on a while...just took me a while to figure out just what was happening.


Dick - KA5KKT

[K9CDR]

Not sure if it has always been this way before in previous versions and this is normal, in which case feel free to add to wants/wishes edit as necessary or if this is new.

When 'out of band' the ability to to change RX or TX antennas via drop downs in the status bar is not there (checkbox is gone). If I go to the nearest amateur band I can do so as expected and then tune back to wherever I was in the non-ham and that selection stays though still unable to change via status bar. If this is by design, the want'wish if easily done would be to have the same ability across the board. But I have a feeling this might be related to the antenna assignment setup tab how thats broken down by ham bands rather than freq range so perhaps everything in between is not part of the function being tied to that...or something.

Another want would be to have the ability by any means (right click somewhere, hotkey, dare i suggest new button--maybe part of the newer CFC/LEV right click assignables) to at least pause/freeze the waterfall at least maybe that entire area whatever its set to and either within the same new feature have screenshot button or otherwise of course a guy can use snipping tool. A much more elaborate and possibly resource hungry tool would be the ability to 'rewind' and go back 15-30 seconds (maybe configurable 1-60 seconds) and play the waterfall back (i would imagine integrating the audio might make this a much tougher task yet) and save it as an .mp4 which I'd imagine would work like some security cams and be recording and temporaily saving blocks of whatever time frame to have already for motion detection clips to come from and this constant video processing may be way more than justified. Other option for this is a cloned feature of the quick rec/.buttons for audio but for waterfall or maybe entire interface with rec button and play which could just call the default vid player up.

[w-u-2-o]

VAC on AM and SAM - When running in most modes via VAC and switching to AM or SAM, the VAC becomes unselected and audio stops. Reselecting VAC brings the audio back. This is not necessarily a 2.9.0 issue...been going on a while...just took me a while to figure out just what was happening.

Dick - KA5KKT

Dick--can you confirm that this is not associated with changes to Transmit Profiles or Band Stacks when you make those mode changes, please? Especially if you have ANY of the "Auto Save TX Profile" options enabled. Those options can really play havoc with the stability and configuration management of your Transmit Profiles.

I'm fairly confident that's the problem, because I have run a 100% remoted station with VAC audio only for years and have never experience the problem you describe except in terms of Transmit Profiles or Band Stack setup. They need to be VAC enabled across the board or you will run into that problem.

73,

Scott

[KA5KKT]

VAC on AM and SAM - When running in most modes via VAC and switching to AM or SAM, the VAC becomes unselected and audio stops. Reselecting VAC brings the audio back. This is not necessarily a 2.9.0 issue...been going on a while...just took me a while to figure out just what was happening.

Dick - KA5KKT

Dick--can you confirm that this is not associated with changes to Transmit Profiles or Band Stacks when you make those mode changes, please? Especially if you have ANY of the "Auto Save TX Profile" options enabled. Those options can really play havoc with the stability and configuration management of your Transmit Profiles.

I'm fairly confident that's the problem, because I have run a 100% remoted station with VAC audio only for years and have never experience the problem you describe except in terms of Transmit Profiles or Band Stack setup. They need to be VAC enabled across the board or you will run into that problem.

73,

Scott

Thank you for the thoughts, Scott.

At present I need to focus on my income taxes which are complicated well beyond what they might be worth to myself or the IRS. Complicated: Toss up between Thetis and Taxes.

I'll get back to this.

Kind regards,
Dick

[ramdor]

PureSignal Feedback colours - what they relate to

Warren recently sent me some info regarding some of things related to pure signal, and said it was fine to post in the forums. Feedback colours referenced in his comments are standard colours and not the reversed/inverted where blue becomes red etc.

Pure Signal and ALC Indication: The “real” ALC meter (not ALC Group which is ALC + Comp) will never exceed 0dB. For PureSignal to function at all, the ALC output MUST peak essentially at 0dB so that the TX signal traverses the entire DAC range. This is always a requirement and has nothing to do with the amount of analog feedback provided through the feedback network and receiver (Other than obviously as peak TX output goes up so does peak analog feedback level).

For me, a low ALC not reaching 0dB has always been the no.1 cause for PS not working, and now I can see why.

Analog feedback levels:
(1) If you’re in ADC overload, you will likely get disastrous PureSignal results as the feedback will be terribly distorted – this is totally unacceptable for operation.
(2) If you’re within about 6dB or so of overload, you MIGHT get a little degradation in IMD performance with PureSignal, depending upon the passive intermod performance of the filters, transformers, etc., preceding the ADC; this has been the ‘blue’ zone,
(3) if you’re in the ‘green’ zone, you’re close to using all the ADC dynamic range and PureSignal performance should be great, assuming no other impeding factors,
(4) in the ‘yellow’ and ‘red’ zones, your feedback signal is getting weaker and weaker and Puresignal performance is degrading accordingly as you use less and less of the ADC dynamic range for your feedback – the less dynamic range you use, the worse your performance is likely to be – these should be considered the caution and unacceptable values.

Some great info there.

73
Richie.

[W4WMT]

The above needs to be made sticky somewhere, so nobody can miss it.
Terribly important!!!

[w-u-2-o]

None of this is new data. It is contained, in much greater detail, in the document "PureSignal.pdf", that is installed in the same directory at Thetis.exe when you run the installer. If you look it should be in there for your review right now. There is also a manual written by Laurence Barker in the same directory, although it does not go into enough detail with respect to PureSignal, hence the additional PureSignal document.

The presence of these documents was once common knowledge, but perhaps it has become overlooked in recent times.

Tomorrow I will endeavor to make a sticky post in the PureSignal sub-forum with that document, and perhaps a few other explanatory notes as above. But again this is not new data, these are not new revelations with respect to PureSignal, these are not secrets that have been hidden for some reason. Of course this is not to say that openHPSDR software and firmware is wonderfully documented, either, but such is the case when everyone that works on it is an open source volunteer. Indeed, the main purpose of this forum is to help fill those documentation holes.

Also, the ALC Group meter mode is not "fake" in any way, the ALC mode does not provide superior or different data. For some reason I don't understand, at some point in the development of PowerSDR mRX the ALC metering was divided into two parts: ALC shows the levels below 0dB ALC, ALC Comp shows the levels above 0dB ALC. All ALC Group does is put those two indications together on the same meter. That way one does not have to switch back and forth between two meters. It is important to note that the ALC algorithm in Thetis (and PowerSDR mRX before it) is an intelligent, look-ahead, soft-limiting algorithm. This makes it quite safe to adjust audio levels such that peaking 1 to 3 dB higher than 0dB ALC will not have any audible effects and doing so provides for much more positive and consistent PureSignal measurement frequency. For some digital modes this may not be optimum, but for phone the effects are essentially inaudible.

If you haven't already you should read all the existing sticky posts in the PureSignal sub-forum. They contain a wealth of information. As do the sticky posts in all of the other sub-forums.

[ramdor]

yep Warren had made the differentiation between alc and alc group in his email to me, I just reworded slightly in parenthesis

The “real” ALC meter will never exceed 0dB. I believe you/someone may have implemented a “hybrid” ALC meter that shows true ALC output up to 0dB and ALC compression above 0dB … that one will exceed 0dB to show the compression.

I still found it to be very handy succinct info and thought others might be interested.

R.

[w-u-2-o]

I've updated the existing top sticky topic with more information:

viewtopic.php?f=20&t=3166

Don't forget to read the other sticky topics, too.

[ramdor]

Feedback required please :

1) change the tune/2tone drive power setting in setup to allow for 3 options

• Use Drive Power (slider) (per band)
• Use Tune Power (slider) (per band)
• Use fixed value (all bands)

2) add new slider under Drive called Tune
3) always use the new slider value for TUNE/2TONE
4) add limiter for both Drive + Tune, so above limit point the slider fills in red, and % drive/tune is not raised when slider is into this red area (much like ic-705 with tx power limiting enabled). Switching off the limit would raise % if the thumb position was sat in the red area. Perhaps a small lock icon to the right to limit, or a right click.
5) hide the tune slider if you are not using it (ie tune/2tone are all set to use either drv power or fixed)

something like :

tuneIdea.png (17.07 KiB) Viewed 6593 times

It would simplify so so much related to having to check state, make sure the correct power is used when tuning/moxing etc. I would need to look at the implications to cat/midi, but it would make life so much easier for the tci side of things to split it up like this. Having a dedicated slider for Tune/2Tone makes sense to me.

Cheers,

Richie.

[Mike_N1JEZ]

Love it!

Remember settings by band?

Make this available in the "transverter" section as well!

Mike

[NC3Z]

Hmmmm, like the concept. So you are saying we could set a max power limit per band??

I would like to see the CAT command stay for TUNE ZZTO

[ramdor]

@ mike
yep, per band. As the xvtr directly controls the dvr slider it would all be handled by the band drv% limiting if enabled

@ gary
yes, but it is a limit to drive% not power per se, as that is limited overall by PA settings
zzto that one that would be quite easy to change/rework I think

Richie.

[DL2XY]

I dont need a 2nd slider for TUNE/2TONE.

I always tune my antennas with less then 1W (fixed TUNE power) and auto diabled xPA so i have no problems with high SWR during tuning.
After that i use 2TONE at normal drive level and auto enabled xPA to "calibrate" pure signal.

But limiting normal drive power to a predefineable value only if xPA is active would be very nice.

Walter

[W1AEX]

Richie,

I definitely like bringing the Tune power limit control out to the GUI with its own slider. At this point I've resorted to the "Use Drive Power" option for Tun and relied on my (faulty) memory to manually drop the Drive level when messing with the antenna tuner or setting up the amplifier. The very visible separate Tune slider would be nice. The settings per band is much appreciated!

73, Rob W1AEX

[W4WMT]

1) scrap the tune drive power setting in setup
2) add new slider under Drive called Tune
3) always use the new slider value for TUNE/2TONE

This would create an extra step for those of us who wish to have the tune/2tone level always be the same as the drive level. No?

[ULTIMAX]

I like that, maybe able to control by right click on the mouse to avoid unsetting what ever value chosen, just my humble opinion.

[w-u-2-o]

It's still important to have a "Use Drive Level" options for both Tune and Two-Tone. In fact I never use Two Tone at anything except drive power. Please don't eliminate those options.

FWIW, my work flow is as follows:

1. QSY
2. TUNE at tune power with amp in standby
3. Switch amp to operate
4. Check drive power with TWO TONE at full drive.

[ramdor]

@scott
do you move drv slider for 2tone? do you have drv slider always maxed for 2tone? do you use the setting in 2tone test to use drive power or do you have 100 pre-set in there?

R.

[ramdor]

also, there is no problem to have something like 3 radio buttons on each of Tune + 2Tone

o Use Drive Power (slider) (per band)
o Use Tune Power (slider) (per band)
o Use fixed value (all bands)

R.

updated post sorry