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  • Author Author: doctorcdf
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Beaglebone Black Radio Challenge

doctorcdf

Table of contents

Beaglebone BlackThe BeagleBone Black is the newest member of the BeagleBoard family. It is a lower-cost, high-expansion focused BeagleBoard using a low cost Sitara™ AM3358 ARM® Cortex™-A8 processor from Texas Instruments, and can connect with the Internet and run software such as Angstrom and Ubuntu. Like its predecessors, the BeagleBone Black is designed to address the Open Source Community, early adopters, and anyone interested in a low cost ARM® Cortex™-A8 based processor.
The Bundle & the Challenge
For the purposes of this "RoadTest Plus", we have bundled the Beaglebone Black with these other products:
  • A 4.3" LCD Screen Cape
  • Adafruit Power Adapter
  • Adafruit BBB Case
  • Adafruit Software Defined Radio Receiver USB Stick
  • Compact USB Wi-Fi Adapter with 4" Antenna
This bundle represents an ideal starting point for the creation of an innovative, fully-featured Internet / Digital Radio.
The selected testers will provide standard RoadTest reviews of the Beaglebone Black and blog in the Single Board Computers area of element14 beginning on Monday, February 17th and finishing on Friday, March 28th, detailing their Beaglebone Radio projects as they progress.  Videos, diagrams and code samples should form part of the submissions.  The RoadTester who provides the most intriguing, engaging material in addition to a fully operational Internet / Digital Radio will win the Grand Prize.
The Grand Prize
Leikr GPS Sport WatchThe winner of this challenge will receive two Grand Prizes, courtesy of Texas Instruments:
  • The Leikr GPS Sports Watch - a unique multisport GPS platform.
  • The Beaglebone Black Battery cape - to encourage our Grand Prize winner to make their solution portable.
Second Chance
Even if you aren't picked as one of our RoadTesters, you can still enter the challenge: merely purchase your own Beaglebone Black and LCD Cape, blog on the Single Board Computers group about your "Beaglebone Radio" using these products, and ensure your final submission is in place by March 28, 2014.
How to Enter
If you are not a member of element14, please click here to join.  If you are a member, click the orange Enroll button on the right just below the Competition title.  Fill out the form completely, including your address and telephone number (necessary so the shipping company can contact you if you are selected); please detail how you will approach this challenge in the "Reason for the RoadTest" box.  Please be as detailed as possible about your ideas; the most innovative and well-thought out proposals will be the ones we select.
Terms & Conditions
  • Individuals will be selected for the "Beaglebone Black Radio" Challenge (henceforth, "The Challenge") on the basis of quality of applications: we expect a full and complete description of why you want to take part in this challenge and your initial ideas for utilising the bundle effectively.
  • Individuals selected for the Challenge will be required to blog about their projects in the Single Board Computers section of element14 on a weekly basis.  Additional content such as videos and designs will be an added bonus when it comes to judging competitors.
  • Failure by a selected individual to participate in accordance with the parameters of the Challenge, provided no reasonable cause for this inability to participate is given, may result in exclusion from future Road Tests and challenges.
  • This competition is not open to individuals employed by the Premier Farnell group of companies.
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Anonymous
  • in reply to doctorcdf

    There are only a few countries listed in the drop down box that appears both in the registration and enrollment forms. It does not include Pakistan. So we cannot participate?

  • in reply to mconners

    Absolutely you can process normal analog data digitally  and also there are data mode traffic in all countries eve if it's only aircraft and keyfobs image

    Also much data is been transmitted from any other country that is of a frequency you can pick up in your country

  • Is it 'okay' to edit an application once it is submitted (as in up until the EndDate)?  Or are submissions judged one time, as they arrive?

  • in reply to shabaz

    (If anyone does find the datasheet for the RTL2832U, please share it :-)

  • in reply to mconners

    From this page Software Defined Radio Receiver USB Stick - RTL2832 w/R820T ID: 1497 - $22.50 : Adafruit Industries, Unique & fun DIY el…

     

    That means you can use a computer (with Windows, Mac, or Linux) to tune into: FM Radio, AM signals (but not AM radio), CW (morse code!), unencrypted radio signals (such as those used by many police and fire departments), POCSAG pagers, and more.


    Sorry, I stand corrected, not AM radio, but you could get FM.

  • in reply to Kuya.Marc

    It doesn't have to be digital radio, it can be any am/fm station.

     

    Mike

  • in reply to Former Member

    Hi Corey, (and anyone else interested),

     

    I think a good chunk of this challenge is software related. I don't think much (if any) soldering will be needed unless people want to do that, since the SDR USB stick is a complete off-the-shelf item (there are some mods in theory that could be done, maybe people have some ideas to share. I may also post some if people are interested - I've not used this with the BBB though, and have very limited exposure (a few hours) with a similar-ish SDR USB stick).

     

    The SDR USB stick uses an RTL2832U IC that (amongst other functions) converts the intermediate frequency (IF) signal (I don't know what frequency IF, I've not looked in detail but the information is on the web) into quadrature signals aka I/Q outputs, which are digitized and sent to the BBB. That is all informational, it is not necessary to know it to use it, because people have figured out how to access and control the RTL2832U, and there is some source code called rtl-sdr which can do that (and it looks like quite readable code). It does work with the BBB because someone used it for creating a spectrum analyser for the BBB using a similar SDR USB stick a few months back. The RTL2832U does more too, I'd love to know about the additional functions inside the IC but the datasheet seems hard to find.

     

    The rtl-sdr software can also decode FM, and pass it to (say) 'aplay' to play out directly, or perhaps you could stream the audio across the network if you desired.

     

    For digital radio stations, in the UK a system called DAB is used (and in some other parts of the world too). The RTL2832U device can apparently directly decode DAB as part of it's functionality, but I've not seen any source code for this, and as mentioned the datasheet would help if it was locatable. However, it is also possible to decode DAB (or any other encoding) in software from the I/Q signals. For DAB, some source code called sdr-j can be used. It has a front end but maybe a command line interface too (I can't recall). These are just some ideas, there could be better ways or alternative software.

     

    For other digital radio technologies for other parts of the world, there may exist some source code, but I don't know unfortunately.

     

    For Internet radio I've never really looked, but I guess it uses RTSP, so more software :-)

     

    Another fun part will be making best use of the display cape (I believe it has touch-sensing capability too) for monitoring or a complete interface maybe. It will display the usual Linux desktop. It will be good to see feedback on this product.

     

    I think the BBB has a good amount of processing power for SDR applications!

  • I'm helping a friend teach an SDR class next quarter and am looking forward to what develops here.  I hope to see something that will carry over to our class.

     

    --Mark

  • I am very new to this kind of stuff ( more into computing ), would this show you how to set it all up ?

  • in reply to Kuya.Marc

    Marcos -

     

    We do offer the option of it being an internet radio as opposed to a digital one - hopefully this will inspire you!

     

    Best Regards, Christian