Message from gccradioscience at Wednesday, 08-Aug-12 06:51:09 GMT

I need to know what gear that nycradio is using so I can get the exact or equivilant to the set up he has as for the AM/FM HD tuner. I have a Auvio HD radio tuner, but I want to get the same antenna setup as what he has. Did he say he has got a RF amplifer? Well mine is junk, it overloads bad it's a Radio Shack 15-1113, it used to work good back then, now strong signals are overloading it. So I need to know what RF amplifer do I need to get? And what antenna is he using? I have a dipole on the ceiling. Alot of help would be appreciated and maybe I might be able to create a node in my local area using a HD radio tuner and connect it to a desktop PC in the living room. HD radio tuner nodes is not hard, but wideband nodes are kinda difficult to obtain.

Message from yvesvdd at Wednesday, 08-Aug-12 09:00:49 GMT

Hello!
A tuner in your location would certainly be interesting :)

Let me make a list of all the things you'll need:
* the Sony XDR-F1HD tuner. This is the best HD tuner available, and it's the tuner we use for Globaltuners. They are not sold anymore, you have to get one via Ebay.

* a seeeduino board. This is necessary for controlling your Sony via PC and online. I recommend getting one here for 22$: http://www.seeedstudio.com/depot/seeeduino-v30-atmega-328p-p-669.html?cPath=132_133

*a infrared LED light that works as a transmitter. (usually very cheap, 1$)
http://dmohankumar.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/ir_led_200807.jpg

* someone with soldering experience (even when the soldering process is actually not that difficult for someone who knows the basics of it).
The NYC node owner has not done this (yet), but he will do this in the near future. This adds a lot of features to your node, such as a signal meter and RDS data. So I really recommend you do this small modification :)

*some software (the software we currently use only works on Windows)

Last edited by yvesvdd at Wednesday, 08-Aug-12 09:20:51 UTC

Last edited by yvesvdd at Monday, 13-Aug-12 20:45:15 UTC

Message from gccradioscience at Thursday, 09-Aug-12 03:16:22 GMT

That's cool, I would like to build this project. I hope that I will come across a Sony HD tuner. I have a bunch of LED's and you can get more at Electronic Goldmine. But what about the antenna set up? I have a junky preamplifer and I need to replace it with something better. What preamps for antennas would you recommend for this project?

Message from yvesvdd at Monday, 13-Aug-12 20:47:01 GMT

This is one of the best FM preamps: http://www.tgn-technology.com/shop/product_info.php?info=p56_UKW-FM-Vorverst-rker-ULNA-3018-88-108-MHz.html

Last edited by yvesvdd at Monday, 20-Aug-12 08:20:05 UTC

Message from vitesse at Saturday, 18-Aug-12 19:59:06 GMT

it seem to indicate -100db for FM band. and seem targeted toward UHF band. are you sure this is good for FM band?

Message from finndx at Sunday, 19-Aug-12 08:49:13 GMT

Scroll down towards the end of that mentioned web page - you can see details about FM preamp there.

There's also a link for page giving us more details about it:
http://www.tgn-technology.com/shop/product_info.php?info=p56_UKW-FM-Vorverst-rker-ULNA-3018-88-108-MHz.html

I think this URL should have been used here. The first one was a bit misleading.