[Discuss-gnuradio] Suse10.1 walkthrough and a question concerning crosstalk

[Mark Sullivan]

When I inject a signal at a -45 dBm level on the "RX-B" sma connector
on a Basic RX daughtercard, I see a copy of the signal on the "RX-A"
side when I use usrp_fft.py. The level is 10-20 dB below that of what I
see if I move the signal from "RX-B" to "RX-A," but this seems like too
much coupling. Using a 50 ohm termination on the unconnected sma
connector helps a little bit. I see no copy of the signal from either
input of the other Basic RX daughtercard. Any thoghts, anyone?

Best regards,

Mark Sullivan


Here is a walkthough I put together for Suse10.1. I found a few "gotchas" not described in the build instructions on the Wiki.

Installing GnuRadio and the USRP on Suse 10.1 for the Linux-impaired.

Version 0.1 22 September 2006

What you will need:

PC with USB 2.0 and DVD drive,
Suse 10.1 DVD,
USRP,
An internet connection,
The better part of an afternoon.

INSTALLING LINUX

Boot from the DVD. Don't use the CD version; it is missing fftw3f.pc and the FFTW package will
not install.

Choose your language of choice and click on NEXT.
Select "YES" to accept the license and click on NEXT.
On the "System Analysis" screen select "New Installation" and click on NEXT.
On the "Time Zone" screen set up your clock and click on NEXT.
On the "Desktop" screen select "Gnome" and click on NEXT.
On the "Installation Summary" screen click on "Software" (it should be displaying "Standard Software
Gnome 2").
The "Software Selection" screen appears. Click on "Details" to customize your selection.
Select "Package Groups" as the Filter; you should get a tree on the left of the screen.
Click on the "development" branch; click on the "package" menu on the toolbar, scroll down to 
"All in this list," in the pull down menu, then select "Install."
Under the "Development" tree, click on "KDE" sub-branch; click on the "package" menu on the toolbar,
scroll down to "All in this list," in the pull down menu, then select "Do not install."
Under the "Productivity" tree, click on "Scientific" sub-branch; click on the "package" menu on the toolbar,
scroll down to "All in this list," in the pull down menu, then select "Install."
Click on the "Libraries" tree; click on the "package" menu on the toolbar,
scroll down to "All in this list," in the pull down menu, then select "Install."
Click on "Accept."
You will get a pop-up window with three warnings. Click on the circles next to
"do not install flex-old" for the first two warnings and click on the circle
next to "do not install gtkl-compat-devel" for the remaining warning.
Click on the "OK, try again" button at the bottom of the pop up window.
An Adobe license window appears; click on the "Accept" button.
A flash player license window appears, click on the "Cancel" button.
The "Installation Settings" window reappears after a long pause.
Click on "Accept" at the lower right hand corner.
A "Confirm" window appears; click "Install."
A "Package Installation" screen appears. Click on the "Details" tab to watch the
progress of the install. This would be a good time to take a break; installation will
take about 1 hour to complete.
The system will reboot and the Install screen re-appears.
Enter your hostname and domain and click on Next.
Enter your root password and click on Next. Write down your root password so you don't
forget it!
A "Network Configuration" screen appears. If you have DHCP set up, select that option and click on Next.
A "Test Connection" window appears. Click on Next. Assuming all is well with the connection,
click on Next again after the test is complete.
An "Online Update" screen appears; select "Configure now" and click on Next.
Wait for a while for the server to be selected.
An "Online Update Configuration" window appears; click on "OK."
Click on the circle next to "Run Update," then click on Next.
A "Update Select" screen appears; click on "Accept"
The YAST package will now be updated. You can update the rest of your system later.
After "Total Progress" reaches 100%, click on Next.
After a pause, the "Update Select" screen reappears. Click on Cancel.
The "Authentication Method" screen appears. Click on the circle next to "Local."
The "New Local User" screen appears. Enter your name, username, and password.
The "Release Notes" screen appears. Click on Next.
The "Hardware Configuration" screen appears. Click on Next.
The "Installation Complete" screen appears. Click on Finish.
Congratulations! You have a shiny new Suse 10.1 box!

INSTALLING SDCC

Log on to your account (not root).
You need to install the SDCC package. Get the source tarball from Sourceforge at
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=599.
(it will be called "sdcc-src-2.6.0.tar.gz" unless a newer version is available now)
Do NOT load the Suse RPMs- the pair of RPMs depend upon each other, and the RPM command
won't install either. Put the tarball in your home directory.
Double-click on the icon for the tarball. A window will appear; click on "Extract."
Click on "Extract" in the new window that appears. This will create a directory called
"SDCC" in your home directory.
Open up a terminal. (Click on "Applications" on the menu toolbar,scroll up to
"System" in the menu that appears,scroll down to "Terminal" in the *next* menu that
appears, then click on "Gnome Terminal" in yet another menu that appears)
In the terminal window, type "cd SDCC" and hit Enter.
Now type "./configure" and hit Enter.
Now type "make" and hit Enter.
now type "sudo make install" and hit Enter.
When asked for the root password, enter it.
type "cd .." and hit Enter.

INSTALLING GNURADIO

Now it's time to install GnuRadio itself. 
Type "svn co http://gnuradio.org/svn/gnuradio/trunk/gnuradio" and hit Enter.
The most current version of GnuRadio is now being loaded onto you machine. When
it's done, note the revision number for future reference.
Type "cd gnuradio" and hit Enter.
Type "./bootstrap" and hit Enter.
Type "./configure" and hit Enter.
You are now ready to install everything except:
gr-audio-osx
gr-audio-portaudio
gr-audio-windows
gr-comedi
gr-ezdop
ezdop

If you needed any of these you willl need to track down the missing dependencies and
install them.

type "make" and hit Enter.
type "make check" and hit Enter.
type "sudo make install" and hit Enter.
When asked for the root password, enter it.

At this point, with a little luck, you have an operational installation.

EXPLORING THE USRP

Connect your USRP (power and USB 2 cables)
There is a tiny little green LED underneath the "A" side receive daughtercard.
It should be flashing at a few times per second.

For the moment you will need to have root priviledges to access the USRP. A procedure to
remove this requirement will appear in the next version of this walkthrough.

type "su" and hit Enter. When prompted for a password, type the root password and hit Enter.
type "export PYTHONPATH=~/gnuradio/lib/python2.4/site-packages" and hit Enter.

You should put this command in your startup file so you won't have to enter it
every time you start up a shell. Instructions will appear will appear in the next version
of this walkthrough.

Type "cd gnuradio-examples/python/usrp" and hit Enter.
Type "python test_counting.py" and hit Enter.
The green LED should be blinking more slowly to indicate a successful load.
You should see messages from "gr_check_counting," with the final message saying something about "enter_LOCKED."
Type a "control-C" character to exit the test.
Type "python benchmark_usb.py" anfd hit Enter.
You should see tests of the USB link up to 32 MB/sec with "OK" displayed after each test.
If you have a daughtercard installed in the "A" connector, you can run a spectrum analyzer.
Type "python usrp_fft.py -d 64 -f 10000000" and hit Enter.
You are now looking at a GUI display of a 1 MHz segment of spectrum centered at 10 MHz.
To change the bandwidth, enter a power of two decimation factor (256 or lower) into the "Decim" field.
To change the center frequency, enter the frequency (in Hz) into the "Center freq" field.
You can also enter the frequency in Mhz followed by a capital "M"

At this point you are ready to start exploring the full potential of your new system!