New: Audio Service through 3.5mm Jack/Speaker Output

It is now live. There is nothing new that needs to be done. Simply plug speakers or headphones into the 3.5mm jack and out comes audio. It’s mostly Khan Academy lectures and TED Talks at the moment.

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Would you look at that! My DreamCatcher has been playing while I’m off at work…

Wow … Broadcasts, not Podcasts?

–Konrad, WA4OSH

I just want to say great job guys! This is absolutely amazing! I’ve been busy working on my truck, but every time I walk in the house and hear it playing, it brings a smile to my face!

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Is there a way to get this audio via the wifi connection?

If not… does someone have waterproof speaker that I can hook directly (no amplification) to the DC

or with 2 AA batteries for $7
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Belkin-TuneCast-II-FM-Transmitter-F8V3080-for-All-iPod-iPhone-MP3-Player/250952196155

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Here’s a valid question, with the lora module, can you rebroadcast on the FM radio channels? I thought I saw somewhere on the forum that it can transmit from 40Mhz to 2Ghz.

Correction:

Range is 40 MHz to 6 GHz

I’m currently using my DC with a mobile FM transmitter. Going to look for something more permanent, I currently have a 15w transmitter, but that’s a bit illegal. :slight_smile:

Ha. That’s right. FM and FSK are the same thing, aren’t they? The problem is that the LoRa radio is being used for satellite reception, so it can’t simultaneously be used for transmitting for low power/personal FM. I think the bandwidth of the SX1280 is also too wide for normal FM, which is (I think) 150 kHz.

a comment that there is also an on board audio amplifier which can be used with an external speaker, after proper configuration (it was tested for Armbian in the past, should work under Skylark too just alsamixer needs to be configured correctly. Also the PA enable gpio to turn it on)

I had forgotten about the speaker pins (the v3.03 the pins are pre-installed.), looking at the audio amp it looks like it could be ~1watt , that would be plenty.

I dug through my stash and pulled out my FM transmitter. It has a bit more power than my car transmitter, (plus it has a volume control) which wouldn’t even make it to where my hammock is. I set it to 1.5w. I will do a drive on my road to see how far it is transmitting. I know on high with an indoor antenna I was able to go about 12 Miles. So hopefully, this will be a lot less. Don’t want the FCC knocking on my door. I do not recommend this for people living in populated areas, my closest neighbor is over a mile away.

Also, if you use PUTTY and connect to the DC, using alsamixer (sudo alsamixer) you can adjust the volume.

How is the sound quality for everyone? I have a plain naked LNB pointed at a tree line, so my SNR is -15dB. At that level, the sound is very skippy; not possible to make much out, but there is sound coming out. Just a simple shroud would give me the extra few dB I need.

Sound is nice and clear, I get quite a bit of looping and stuttering though. Is there anyway to prevent this? I am getting 100% audio. I am using a DC 3.02.

outernet audiio

@Syed
On my 3.02, after a re-boot, the audio started, and sounded good for a few seconds, then began what @kb2sdrjay Jason referred to as looping and stuttering. I only had a limited time to listen this morning, however, so far what is coming out of the audio jack is not usable. I re-booted a second time, but it did not seem to improve, but I will check it off and on to see how it is going. What I was able to hear was not bad quality, as far as the sound itself; it just seemed to have a problem playing through.

I had to reboot this morning when I saw audio in the tuner tab. Nothing was coming until I rebooted. The same for yesterday as well.

What is the SNR that you both have?

On the downside, the audio frames seem to be affecting what was a stable setup on my DC. It has gone into a “locked up mode” several time. The packet led is on continuous, the heatbeat strops. It takes a power removal reboot to get it back running.

My bitrate and packet rate is down,

But I had some thunderstorms pass by and may have knocked my dish out of alignment.

Yes, I’m having trouble with audio also. Stuttering and looping. At this time SNR is better than -1. RSSI is -73. Valid packets is 100%. Audio packets received is 1 count difference from audio packets played.
Like: 47180 received, 47179 played. When in a loop, the count stops. A loop could last over 5 seconds. Stuttering very annoying too. I know the Team will fix. :smile:

@Syed
My SNR is varying from -11 to -13, normally running -12, RSSI at -83 -84. All symptoms similar to @kb2sdrjay and @donde. We are having some weather-related interference just now, but not severe.

I’ll talk to @Abhishek about the stuttering on Monday. I thought it was isolated to myself, due to being at -15dB SNR. But if someone with -3dB is experiencing the same issue, then it must be related to something else. My Dreamcatcher also locked up after about an hour (or less).

@Syed My SNR is + 1.5 .

Another idea for the headphone jack,

Could a tone be output to headphone jack to assist in pointing/aligning the antenna, probably based on frequency of the flashing pckt led. ???

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