PowerSDR on iPad via TeamViewer

I tested this arrangement this morning on an iPad Air (iOS 7).  With Power SDR software running my Flex-3000 and accessed via TeamViewer I was able to control the radio using a little mouse pointer on the iPad screen. I also verified the ability to zoom in using the two-finger pinch gesture. Below are two views captured with a digital camera.

Normal full window view of PSDR. Other PC taskbar icons are visible at bottom of screen.

Zoomed-in to the maximum amount.

I also had the receive audio playing from the iPad since I activated a virtual audio cable connecting the Flex-3000 audio to default playback. At times the audio would go choppy for several seconds and then settle out for a few minutes. I also heard audio in the background from the web link I still had open to a Flex-6700.

A few weeks earlier I tested the equivalent remote control capability from my Android smartphone using TeamViewer. Of Course, that screen is much smaller, but I was able to zoom in, albeit requiring a lot of panning to navigate.

-John

Microphone level setting in Windows 7

In recent Google Hangouts and tests of patching a Hangout to an HF transceiver, the need for adjusting microphone gain was noted. Many of us were familiar with how to set microphone gain in Skype, since it provides an explicit setting option for this. (The Google Hangout app does not.) Some are familiar with how to set this in Windows XP via its audio mixer settings, but those settings seemed to be absent in Windows 7.

After a little digging around this morning I found where to set microphone gain in Windows 7.
This is also documented in a Microsoft Support article. Start by right-clicking the familiar speaker icon in your lower right desktop corner (task bar on bottom). You'll get the menu shown below.

Click on Recording devices and see the window shown below.

Click on the Recording tab, verify the microphone device you want to use is designated as default, click on it to select and then click Properties. Next you'll see the window below.

Click on the Levels tab and you'll see slider controls for Microphone and Boost, or possibly just Boost. Here you can adjust the level for your microphone. I've verified this on three different Windows 7 computers, and noted that the microphone level defaults to 100%. If your audio app, such as Google Hangouts, is getting too much audio you can reduce it here.

While digging around in these settings I also found an option that should let me try my headset microphone with the Flex-3000. The Listen tab on the Microphone Properties page has an option to "Listen to this device" and choose "Playback through" a device selected on a pull-down menu. There I can choose the virtual audio cable for my transmit audio. I'll try this on an upcoming QSO.

JK

View of 7120 and up

Here is the view starting at 7120 at 0801 CST.

A view of 40 m

Here is the view as we QSO on 7195 this morning.

Here is the waterfall display in the same frequency range, showing the signal intensity vs time.

Virtual Audio Cables

With the Flex-3000 in house, I wanted to set up to use some digital modes. The instructions led me to the Virtual Audio Cable (VAC) program to make the digital audio connections between the digital mode software (e.g. DigiPan, JT65) and the PowerSDR program that runs the Flex.  The basic features of VAC are described in the program's help file and are illustrated in the following figure from that source.

 VAC provides a one-way "pipe" to interconnect digital audio streams between programs on a single Windows PC. The figure shows multiple applications that play or generate audio, connected to a single virtual cable that can then connect to multiple applications that accept audio input. To test the ability to combine multiple sources, I set up the arrangement shown below. In the VLC media player and the PowerSDR program I selected the same virtual cable for their outputs. At the Skype program I selected the virtual cable for its input. In a test call using Skype, the audio streams of both sources were audible. The audio level for each source must be set in its respective program.  

The ability to combine multiple audio streams and to transport the result to multiple programs may provide some possibilities for implementing audio patches for remote callers to access a radio transceiver.  Using two virtual cables I connected the Flex-3000 to Skype or to a Google Hangout for bidirectional audio and made some test calls to verify transmission. Below is a figure showing the test arrangement.

This arrangement provides sufficient audio paths for a single remote operator to talk through and listen to the transceiver.  

As usual, the challenge with a third-party patch is to find a place where the local station microphone can connect to the transmit audio and to the distant caller. Possibilities include:

• Station microphone connected to the transceiver in the normal manner, working in harmony with the audio on VAC1 (if they are not mutually exclusive)
• Microphone connected via some audio program to the VAC1 for transmit
• Microphone connected via some audio program to the VAC2 for talking to the remote device user

Transmit audio monitoring, built into the transceiver, enables the station operator to hear the audio transmitted by the distant caller.

In the absence of audio stream bridging within the Windows PC, a second Skype or Google Hangout session can be connected via conference call with the session that provides the transceiver patch.

Further testing is needed to determine what programs and devices are  available to implement the full patching capabilities.