RX1 acting up whereas RX2 is not

[JJ4SDR]

Tried another PC (laptop) and the same exact issue could be observed several minutes into monitoring, a carbon copy of the ebb-and-flow, on both RX1 and RX2. Same antenna, same band.

At one point, I thought that perhaps I should include Thetis and The OpenHPSDR (in Roaming) sub-folder in exclusions and that my Anti-Malware software - Emsisoft - might play a role there, when it decides to start scanning all of a sudden. After adding these exclusions for both "Monitoring" and "Scanning" I detect no difference and the problem persists. So, I guess I go back to the Thetis version I used almost 2 years ago (and Protocol 1) and see if that makes any difference. I highly doubt it as I had been using that software/firmware combo for a long time with absolutely no problems. Same PC, same antennas and same everything.

Juha

[PD3LK]

Just to rule Thetis out, see what happens when you use SDR-Console?
It can't show RX1 and RX2 the same time but you can switch between them. (Main/RX1)

r/Leon

[JJ4SDR]

Tried again this morning as the temperature in the shack is much lower and until now, lower temp has been the "saving grace." After about 30 minutes of monitoring, both RX1 and RX2 exhibited a very low noise floor. So, this appears to be getting progressively worse.

How many separate boards are there inside the ANAN 7000 DLE MKII? Perhaps the FPGA is failing (Orion board). Be that as it may, I think I will get back to using my over 30 year old Kenwood TS-950SDX. Perhaps the ANAN could serve as expensive decoration on my book-shelf.

Leon: That's an intriguing suggestion. However, I have now had 3 different versions of Thetis installed and the latest one (IF this has to do with Thetis) has acted up. I haven't rolled back to the original Thetis that I used almost 2 years ago. So, I will do that next.

[w-u-2-o]

At this point, assuming you have not made some mistake somewhere, either in testing or reporting, it's not something you can fix with another version of Thetis or with another version of firmware.

The best answer is to give this unit to somebody else and see if they can duplicate your problem. Doug couldn't. If somebody else can't, then the problem is in your shack and not in the hardware. Note: I am not volunteering

[JJ4SDR]

Scott,

Fair statement.

Tell me, could the FPGA (the array is on the Orion board, correct?) be at fault?

Why wouldn't my Kenwood not exhibit this issue, using the same antenna?

Juha

[K1LSB]

Juha,

Your Kenwood is an entirely different animal than your Anan, they're literally worlds apart in their receivers' front ends.

I'm again extending you the offer to bring your radio over to my QTH and see how it behaves in my shack. IMPORTANT: Send me a copy of your database.xml before you come.

Contact me before you come, of course.

Mark

[w-u-2-o]

If the FPGA was broken the unit would probably not run at all.

Now that we are back to blaming hardware, and have almost certainly ruled out the RF board since you've had it replaced and the problem persists, then it's conceivable that you have a cracked solder connection somewhere on the Orion board. Such a problem might also be both thermally and shock sensitive. It's even conceivable that the trip to Doug "fixed" it, then it failed again after you got it back.

This might sound crazy, but when you are observing a low noise floor condition, try banging on the chassis of the 7000, or even pick it up a half an inch and drop it. If it were a loose connection, bad relay, or bad solder connection this might help identify that sort of problem.

Grasping at straws....

[JJ4SDR]

Thanks Mark! And I will advise either way.

Scott: Copy that!

[Joe-W4WT]

Juha, I am flabergasted that you are waffling about taking up Mark's very GRACIOUS offer to come over to his house and plug your radio into his power supply and his antennas and thus be able to completely eliminate your WHOLE HOUSE from this equation. Expecially when google earth shows you only live 10 air miles from him! That's what, a 20 minute drive at most? Instead, you continue to spend untold hours speculationg and draw in others to speculate about what might be wrong when you have the opportunity to clearly prove if the radio is at fault or not.

Maybe there is someting I don't know of that precludes this action but if it was me, I'd be over at Marks as soon as possible with a supply of his favorite beverage in one hand and the radio in the other salivating about the prospect of eliminating or condeming the radio as the culprit in this months long saga.

Joe, W4WT

[JJ4SDR]

Joe,

W5WC , Doug, had my radio in his shack twice and wasn't able to reproduce the issue, that's why.

Mark's offer is indeed very gracious, but I also have a life apart from ham radio and so I won't always be able to
do what I should be doing.

Juha

[w-u-2-o]

I've got to stand with Joe on this one.

Albert Einstein once said, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

[K1LSB]

Juha,

I also have an exceedingly busy life, I work full-time and have a lot of personal to-do's currently on my own plate, so my offer wasn't made casually.

One thing I keep wondering is whether there's something (or maybe several things) in your database that's causing your rig to misbehave. There are a lot of settings and toggles in your database that the rest of us have no idea what you have them set to.

My plan (and the reason for my request that you send me your database before you arrive) was to stand up your radio in my shack with my database and see if it behaves normally (after first substituting your rig's IP address into my database so Thetis can communicate with it). If it does behave normally then I'd send you back home with my database to see if your rig functions correctly at your QTH with my settings. If your rig functions normally back at your QTH with my database then that would expose your database as the culprit.

If your rig doesn't operate correctly at your QTH with my database then that would point to something at your QTH.

So a trip to my QTH would accomplish several things:

1) It would show us whether your hardware is the problem.

2) It would show us whether your database is the problem.

3) It would show us whether something specific to your QTH (antenna, jumpers, grounding, evil spirits, etc.) is the problem.

I'm off work tomorrow so I have a three-day weekend, I could probably accommodate whatever time slot you could find in your own schedule for a visit. I don't know that I could make that same offer on any other weekend.

Your call.

Mark

[K1LSB]

UPDATE:

Juha just texted me, he's coming over Saturday so we have a path forward.

Mark

[w-u-2-o]

Very nice of you, Mark!

Is Juha bringing any of your favorite beverage?

I know at least I am eagerly awaiting the outcome of this experiment.

[K1LSB]

I neglected to even ask, lol. Not a problem, I keep plenty Yuengling in the fridge!

I will update all on the results.

Mark

[JJ4SDR]

Mark,

I DO look forward to the investigation and I am grateful to you for the very kind offer.

I will also do some "banging" tonight as per Scott's great suggestion

Joe put me up to it and I will be probably be bringing beverages.

Juha

[K1LSB]

POST-VISIT REPORT:

Well, Juha came by today but we got absolutely nowhere -- we never were able to get Bootloader to communicate with Juha's Anan. We tried everything, we tweaked every Ethernet setting we could think of and nothing worked. We spent at least an hour before we decided that we'd exhausted all of our options. So we swapped the radios back again, putting my Anan back into its proper position, and we couldn't even get bootloader to recognize my rig. At that point I apologized to Juha for wasting his time and he left, no better off than when he arrived.

I went back to my computer to try to get Bootloader to recognize my rig, with no joy at all. Finally, just because I'm insane, I moved the rig's bootloader switch to Off, rebooted the rig and fired up Thetis just to see what would happen.

Lo and Behold, Thetis fired right up with no problem! Gobsmacked, I then set the bootloader switch to On, rebooted the radio and tried HPSDRBootloader again, and again it failed to recognize my rig.

Just posting this to make everyone aware of my observations. If anyone else observes the same thing, please reply in this thread!

Mark

PS -- Juha didn't neglect the beverages!

[Edited to remove inaccurate statement.]

[w-u-2-o]

Guessing you have Winpcap installed. Uninstall it. Reboot. Install Npcap. Reboot.

If you do have Npcap installed, then uninstall, reboot, reinstall, reboot.

Finally, remember that Bootloader will not work through a managed switch and sometimes even a dumb switch. This is because the ANAN advertises an illegal MAC address in Bootloader mode. Make a direct connection to the PC if you have to.

[K1LSB]

Scott,

Npcap was installed, I uninstalled it and installed the latest per your link. Problem solved, many thanks!

I feel terrible that I'm not more versant with that stuff, as Juha's trip was rather wasted (other than me getting to meet a great guy!).

Mark

[JJ4SDR]

Mark,

It was great meeting you today. I really enjoyed seeing you and I am very grateful to you for having spent time with me, in an effort to get to the bottom of it. Perhaps we do it again some time soon !

What I did after returning home from Mark's was, I switched the radio back on and, as usual, after just a few minutes, the noise floor went down, real low, like I had no antenna. The floor went up again and, this ebb-and-flow continued for several minutes and finally the floor hit the - well -floor, like I had no antenna connected. I lifted the front end of the radio about half-an inch, and then, let it drop. The result was that the noise floor went up to "normal." I had also texted Mark about this same observation before I drove out to meet him.

Note, I took the cover off just now, but I will need to tread carefully, taking pictures as well, at least if I were to proceed and actually eye-ball boards. I don't have a real work-bench so perhaps this wasn't such a bright idea after all. I wanted to try and determine if there was any way I could locate whether there is a poor connection, cold solder and loose ribbon and other cables/connectors. It seems that boards slide off, but then the challenge is how how do I actually go about sliding them out. I see some quick-connects that will help free boards, but there are plenty of other connectors and cables too.

I thought I would actually be able to run the radio while tugging on cables (risking them coming off and not being able to put them back on IF I can't get direct access to the boards).

Could someone who has done this chime in so that I don't make things even worse before I continue? Any instructions on doing this correctly?

Juha

[w-u-2-o]

Without doing anything except dropping the front and rear panels you can check all the SMA connectors. They don't need to be super tight. 8 inch-pounds is max. torque on those. Basically just snug. 5/16” wrench.

If that doesn't do the trick then the next step is to tap or press on the boards in different spots with a small, wooden (non-conducting) stick.

[WA4SIX]

Back in the day, I used to find overheated components with Radio Shack Color TV Tuner Cleaner. Not sure if there is an equal in this EPA compliant world.

Ed

[JJ4SDR]

Will work on the SMAs first, hoping that will do the trick.

Do the boards just slide out (in case I have to go that route) so that I could use a non-conducting "stick" to tap on spots? I would imagine they will, provided that whatever cables, ribbons or otherwise here are, have plenty of slack, so that I wouldn't accidentally pull any connectors loose.....I was also thinking that I could spot cold solder-joints that I could touch up. I have a brand-new soldering station by Weller with plenty of small/tiny tips.

When I worked - as an apprentice - in a local TV/radio repair shop (in the 1970s) when going to college, technicians used a cold/freezing "spray", to hunt down components that failed due to thermal issues while the device was plugged in. I was hoping that I could do the same with the ANAN. If I can't have the radio actually in "operate" then this sort of technique would be an exercise in futility.

Juha

[Joe-W4WT]

"Back in the day, I used to find overheated components with Radio Shack Color TV Tuner Cleaner"

Ed, I simply use canned 'air". If you turn the bottle upside down and spray it, a liquid will come out and perform the same as your "tuner cleaner" did back in the day. Leaves no residue unlike the old tuner cleaner. Works like a charm. I've fixed many intermittant problems, both heat related and cold solder joints using this stuff. Brand shouldn't matter.

Juha, you could use this to possibly find the problem, assuming the problem is in the radio. If it is heat related, you can wait until it fails and then just spray an entire board. If it comes back to life, you know that board is the problem and then you can narrow down the area by waiting on the failure to return and spray just part of the board. Rinse, repeat. Eventually you should zero in on it. If the problem is a cold solder joint, you want to spray the board while the radio is working to try to cause it to fail. If it does, wait for it to start working again then start limiting your area that you are spraying to zero in on the problem area.

Juha, unless you are skilled in doing surface mount repair, don't even try to solder the board yourself. The results will probably not be to your liking. The above is just to confirm there is a problem and hopefully find a way to reproduce it that you can then tell someone who is skilled at SMD work where to look and how to duplicate the failure.

Joe, W4WT

[JJ4SDR]

Don't like the way the ribbon cable is "kinked". See image below. This is the cable between J16 (I believe this is on the Orion board) and J2 that is on the small board with PTT IN/OUT, LINE INs, DIG INs, OC outputs and L and R Speaker connection.
Hard to reach some of the SMA connectors incidentally as they are pretty deep into the chassis unless I could slide the two boards (there is an aluminum plate between the two boards) I could slide the 2 boards and metal plate out in "unison."
I am taking copious amounts of pictures and being EXTRA careful to not mess with anything.

Joe: Yup, I am not going to even attempt soldering SMD components. I worked in electronics manufacturing (cell phone industry) for many years. I thought that there might be some THT components initially. Also, I don't think it is easy to actually have the radio in "operate" mode while "tapping" on parts of the 2 boards unless I could just lose the cover and have the radio "operating", just without the cover.

Juha

Ribbon cabe between J2 and J16.jpg (922.19 KiB) Viewed 2869 times

[JJ4SDR]

Got the boards and the aluminum plate to slide in "unison," after disconnecting a slew of connectors (apart from SMA ones), taking oodles of photos along the way. This was prompted by the results from my first attempt late last night and the observation this morning where neither RX1 nor RX2 would come "alive" with a "normal" noise floor despite my having dropped the the radio from about half inch (2-3 times) whereas as it readily did earlier. Again, perhaps the drops unseated the ribbon connector at J16 (see later). Also, I connected the same antenna to RX2 (and shared ADC1 between RX1 and RX2) and both RX1 and RX2 exhibited the same, "normal" noise floor with no changes in either over a 30 minute period.

It was quite tricky to get all connectors mated in a solid manner and I was being EXTRA careful, but I think I did a fairly good job. The proof will be in the "pudding," or should I say "noise floor." The ribbon cable that looked "kinked" (I realize that that may not be "unusual") got my attention and upon closer inspection I saw that the ribbon connector at J16 was not well seated. J16 is on the Orion board. So, I got that well seated now, paying particular attention to it before I put the back and front plates back on, making sure that it (or any other connectors) hadn't come loose while I was fiddling with getting the boards to slide back in "concert."

On a side-note, why can't they invest a few cents more to buy ribbon cables that are just a little bit longer (there is still some space to accommodate that)? That way it is way easier to negotiate tight corners and spaces and avoid the kind of ugly kink in the cable and unseating that I saw. Also, it seemed like that particular connector exhibited a tendency to not seat in a solid, tight enough manner. Perhaps I should have taped it down, for "insurance," that seemed like a bear of a prospect as a task so I caved.


Question:
When I visited Mark yesterday (I enjoyed meeting a great fellow!) he told me that (I think it wasn't he but someone else, I could be wrong) that the BNC connectors may not see good ground sometimes. This, owing to the lock washer not "biting" well enough into the back apron (plate) and as the surface is painted, a poor ground may also cause intermittent issues.

Is the above something that has happened to many of you?

STATUS:
It is quite hot in the shack now (I won't be operating ) and so far so good (no abnormal changes in noise-floor), with RX1 and RX2 behaving in tandem, both receivers sharing ADC0. I tried ADC1 too with the antenna connected to RX2 and both RX1 and RX2 looked "normal".

We shall see

Juha

[w-u-2-o]

Some people have experienced bad performance from the limited grounding/bonding of the Apache chassis designs. This goes way back even to the ANAN-10. This includes every sort of problem: EMI, RFI, audio hums, etc.

At issue is basically painted surfaces at areas where chassis components are fastened. This includes front and rear panels and also connectors.

Of course you also have the opposite problem of aluminum oxide formation on unpainted surfaces. The "A" answer is class 3 (chromate) conversion coating, then masking, then painting, and liberal use of star washers. However chromate/mask/paint is a very expensive process and would undoubtedly increase the cost of the product substantially.

It doesn't seem like you are experiencing such problems. In the meantime, we all eagerly await the results of your connector reseating experiment!

[JJ4SDR]

Scott,

I appreciate your expert comments as always.

Now, I have had the radio on all day to see if I can observe any ebb-and-flow in the noise floor. So far, the several times I have looked in on the radio, no abnormal drops in noise floor . Will see if the connector seating (and other tugging and checking of SMA connectors were "snug"....some seemed border-line) remedied this .

Now, I posted on another sub-forum about something that I had not experienced ever before (happens on transmit) and I am HOPING that it hasn't got anything to do with my rather invasive "sleuthing." If it does I will need to look into that next .

Juha

UPDATE:
I have been playing with too many amps. TX Problem solved.

[JJ4SDR]

I switched the radio on Saturday morning (it stayed on for about 12 hours straight) with no ebb-and-flow in noise-floor on either RX1 or RX2 (sharing the same antenna among the receivers, just like before). Did the same this Sunday morning, and both receivers appear to be behaving "normally." On both days, I popped in the shack a half dozen times, just to check up on my "patient." Stayed in the shack, monitoring for a few minutes during each visit to the shack. So, results from this week-end's observations are positive, so far:) ! Steady as she goes and we shall see.

Now, I am not totally convinced that the ribbon cable between J16 the Orion board and the small board (J2 connector on that board) that sports PTT IN/OUT, DIG IN 1/2, LINE IN R/L, OC Outputs, R and L Speakers (on that small board) is the culprit. As reported earlier, the ribbon cable connection at J16 on the Orion board looked tenuous, with "daylight" clearly visible at J16, which I remedied.

I was "expecting" that there would be an issue with the other board (that sports RF/Filter functionality, among other things) that has ADC circuitry on it (I could be off-base there). I did snug up all SMA connectors on both boards. I think there are 3 on the RF/Filter board and 5 on the Orion board. There were several other connectors and other ribbon cable connectors that I also looked at very carefully and "reseated" them just in case, by first unplugging and then plugging them back in. Also, I very carefully applied very little De-Oxit to several connectors, for "insurance."

I remain hopeful that the partial disassembly I did (twice, with the 2nd one being much more like a "disassembly") and the sleuthing paid off. Will keep vigilant and on the look-out for anything untoward. Now that I am gradually - I think - being able to become less paranoid, I am cautiously looking forward to enjoying this fabulous radio again ! At least, I got to learn much about my own shortcomings and this fine radio !

No matter which connection was intermittent (I am really hoping that this was strictly a mechanical issue and not cold solder joints) they will likely have gotten straightened out.

I value the support of many of you dearly ! Despite my mule headedness, you still had a desire to chime in patiently to say the least! And, Mark, K1LSB, even offered to put my radio in his shack, allowing me to enter his home, and getting to know him as well. Wonderful fellow!

The 2 year warranty is up in a few days.

Juha
NI2M

[w-u-2-o]

59 posts and 1 loose connector! It's interesting how we always want to blame the software, myself included, but sometimes the answer is a bit more old school!