Difference between revisions of "Portsdown 4"

Revision as of 17:21, 26 August 2020

The Portsdown 4 system has been specifically designed to be used with the Raspberry Pi 4 and the official Raspberry Pi 7 inch touchscreen. It will drive a LimeSDR (tested with the Mini, but probably Lime SDR USB as well), the DATV Express board (DVB-S only) and, as an experimental capability, the Pluto SDR.

No other models of Raspberry Pi or touchscreen are planned to be supported in the near future so please don't ask.

Capabilities

The Portsdown 4 has the following capabilities:

DVB-S and DVB-S2 (MPEG-2 and H264) transmissions from a LimeSDR Mini connected by USB
DVB-S and DVB-S2 (H264 only) transmissions from a Pluto SDR connected by USB
DVB-S (MPEG-2 and H264) transmissions from a DATV Express Board connected by USB
Supported transmit video sources include the Raspberry Pi Camera, C920 WebCam or a USB-connected EasyCap composite video capture device
Streaming to the BATC Streamer using the Raspberry Pi Camera or EasyCap composite video capture device
Reception and display of DVB-S and DVB-S2 (MPEG-2, H264 and H265) signals received by a BATC MiniTiouner Mk 2 connected by USB.
Display of streams from the BATC Streamer

The Portsdown 4 does NOT support the BATC Filter-modulator board or Ugly mode.

Currently not everything is working, so please have patience.

Hardware

The Portsdown 4 GPIO Connections are defined here: Portsdown 4 GPIO Connections.

Software

The software build is also compatible with the Langstone Microwave transceiver software, which can be loaded by from touchscreen selections (menu 2) AFTER the Portsdown software has been installed. To operate, the Langstone software needs a Pluto to be connected by USB, and a compatible USB Audio dongle.

The build is on GitHub at https://github.com/BritishAmateurTelevisionClub/portsdown4

You MUST start with a fresh build of Raspios Buster (NOT Raspbian) on an SD Card of 8 GB or greater, so you will need to rebuild any previous Langstone or Portsdown A27 card.

Pluto Capabilities

The Pluto mode is experimental at present and is described here Portsdown 4 Pluto.

FAQ

Is it possible to rotate the PiCam image in software as it is on it's side?

No - you need to do the camera mounting modification which Colin G4KLB described in CQ-TV 267

Can I upgrade from Langstone or a previous version incluing Portsdown A27?

No - you must start with a clean image on your SD card

When I try to update I get the error "Unable to contact GitHub for update, Internet connection to Google seems OK". The solution is to log in by ssh and run the following commands:

cd /home/pi
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/BritishAmateurTelevisionClub/portsdown4/master/update.sh  -O /home/pi/update.sh
chmod +x /home/pi/update.sh
./update.sh

More information

For early release information see https://forum.batc.org.uk/viewtopic.php?f=103&t=6804

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
-The Portsdown 4 system has been specifically designed to be used with the Raspberry Pi 4 and the official Raspberry Pi 7 inch touchscreen.
+The Portsdown 4 system has been specifically designed to be used with the Raspberry Pi 4 and the official Raspberry Pi 7 inch touchscreen.  It will drive a LimeSDR (tested with the Mini, but probably Lime SDR USB as well), the DATV Express board (DVB-S only) and, as an experimental capability, the Pluto SDR.
 '''No other models of Raspberry Pi or touchscreen are planned to be supported in the near future so please don't ask.'''
@@ Line 16: / Line 16: @@
 The Portsdown 4 does '''NOT''' support the BATC Filter-modulator board or Ugly mode.
-Currently not everything is working, so have patience.
+Currently not everything is working, so please have patience.
 ==Hardware==
@@ Line 29: / Line 29: @@
 '''You MUST start''' with a fresh build of Raspios Buster (NOT Raspbian) on an SD Card of 8 GB or greater, so you will need to rebuild any previous Langstone or Portsdown A27 card.
+==Pluto Capabilities==
+The Pluto mode is experimental at present and is described here [[Portsdown 4 Pluto]].
 ==FAQ==