DELARANEWS
Dan
Dan Romanchik, KB6NUProgramming is hard
I own a FlexRadio 6400, and overall, I’m quite happy with it. It’s probably the best- performing radio that I’ve ever used, Having said that, it’s not perfect. Recently, Flex released an update to SmartSDR, and for some folks, the update caused their radios to quit working. This appears to be happening for those who haven’t installed new SDR cards in their radios. SDR card corruption is a known problem for some FlexRadios. There has also been some discontent with the speed at which Flex addresses bugs in the software and releases new features. This prompted one fellow to post to FlexRadioSmartSDR@groups.io: I’ve had my 6400M for a couple of years now and have seen very few new features added to it (smartcontrol & memory functions)via software update. Most software updates have centered around fixing bugs. This platform has so many possibilities, but Flex is not living up to the hype of its advertising. It’s more like new software = same old radio OR new software = brick your radio. I replied: I agree with Dennis that the FlexRadio platform has a lot of potential, and I’m a little surprised that there aren’t more third-party developers. I think that there maybe be two reasons for that: 1. FlexRadios aren’t cheap. As a result, maybe there aren’t enough of them out there for a third-party developer to make any money developing third-party apps. I’m thinking that’s the reason that Flex themselves haven’t added more features. The return on investment just isn’t there. 2. Developing this kind of software is hard. It takes a lot of expertise and a lot of time. I thought about trying to develop a better Free DV waveform after reading about its limitations somewhere. I quickly realized, however, that I currently do not have the skills to do that, nor do I want to spend the time developing those skills. Does the Flex live up to its hype? I’d say so, but I can see how some users could be disappointed. Nothing’s perfect, however. I guess that if you want something that’s more plug and play, you should get something like an ICOM IC-7610. I’ve decided to wait a bit before upgrading my SmartSDR software. That should give things time to settle down a bit. The post Programming is hard appeared first on KB6NU's Ham Radio Blog.
DELARANews
Dan
Dan Romanchik, KB6NUProgramming is hard
I own a FlexRadio 6400, and overall, I’m quite happy with it. It’s probably the best-performing radio that I’ve ever used, Having said that, it’s not perfect. Recently, Flex released an update to SmartSDR, and for some folks, the update caused their radios to quit working. This appears to be happening for those who haven’t installed new SDR cards in their radios. SDR card corruption is a known problem for some FlexRadios. There has also been some discontent with the speed at which Flex addresses bugs in the software and releases new features. This prompted one fellow to post to FlexRadioSmartSDR@groups.io: I’ve had my 6400M for a couple of years now and have seen very few new features added to it (smartcontrol & memory functions)via software update. Most software updates have centered around fixing bugs. This platform has so many possibilities, but Flex is not living up to the hype of its advertising. It’s more like new software = same old radio OR new software = brick your radio. I replied: I agree with Dennis that the FlexRadio platform has a lot of potential, and I’m a little surprised that there aren’t more third-party developers. I think that there maybe be two reasons for that: 1. FlexRadios aren’t cheap. As a result, maybe there aren’t enough of them out there for a third- party developer to make any money developing third-party apps. I’m thinking that’s the reason that Flex themselves haven’t added more features. The return on investment just isn’t there. 2. Developing this kind of software is hard. It takes a lot of expertise and a lot of time. I thought about trying to develop a better Free DV waveform after reading about its limitations somewhere. I quickly realized, however, that I currently do not have the skills to do that, nor do I want to spend the time developing those skills. Does the Flex live up to its hype? I’d say so, but I can see how some users could be disappointed. Nothing’s perfect, however. I guess that if you want something that’s more plug and play, you should get something like an ICOM IC-7610. I’ve decided to wait a bit before upgrading my SmartSDR software. That should give things time to settle down a bit. The post Programming is hard appeared first on KB6NU's Ham Radio Blog.
