Waterfall versus PanFall

Tim K8XS

Just for clarification, what exactly is meant by Waterfall in the Road map? I use PanFall all the time with my 5K and PSDR. I seldom, if ever, just display the Waterfall. I ask the question because Waterfall and PanFall are listed as separate items in the Road map and are scheduled for different delivery times. I have no problem with having to have two windows (displays) of the same frequencies, one a panadapter and the other a waterfall that I could position either above or below the panadaptor as long as the two displays are in constant sync wrt frequency. For example, if I zoom in on the panadaptor, I would want the waterfall to zoom also (automatically). If I changed the displayed frequencies on the panadaptor, I would want the waterfall to automatically follow. To me it sounds like I am describing PanFall, unless PanFall has the pan display and Waterfall in the same window. To me and the way I operate, just being able to display a waterfall is useless if it doesn't track a pan display. If I have to manually tune or zoom the waterfall to keep it in sync with the panadaptor display, I will never use it. Maybe I am being short sighted and viewing everything through the PSDR paradigm. If so, could someone please enlighten me. Thanks, Tim K8XS P.S. While I am on my soapbox... Could someone from Flex please provide the official names for the software that runs on the PC and the firmware that runs in the 6XXX. Calling them both SSDR is leading to all kinds of confusion. If they are both SSDR, could you please provide a way to differentiate the two separate pieces in a discussion.

Al K0VM

Tom, I can't speak for flex, but I would call the part that runs in the 6xxx SERVER firmware and the part the runs on thePC CLIENT software. the current SSDR isntall package includees both, but there are ( can be) other PC softwares (CLIENTS) that can interact directly with the SERVER firmware. with out interacting directly with the SSDR CLIENT.. It'll be interessting to see how the waterfall/panfall is implimented. AL, K0VM

Tim - W4TME

Tim, The client software is officially called SmartSDR for Windows. The software in the radio is called SmartSDR. Both are synchronized together, meaning if you load version 1.0.0 of SmartSDR for Windows (or SmartSDR-Win) it will load the appropriate version of software for the radio. This is why if you run an earlier version of SmartSDR-Win, the radio does an software upgrade (actually a "downgrade"). When referring one, you are automatically referring to the set.

Bill-W9OL

I've grown to prefer the PANADAPTOR as my display of choice. Maybe it's because I am a DXer, that I like seeing the DX station (I call them blips for want of a better term) in the display. Plus it seems to make it easier for me to pick up the 'last worked' station. I've tried the other displays and always reverted back to Panadaptor. Maybe I'm not using the other displays to my advantage: so I'm open to suggestions. pse and tu.

W5XZ - dan

"Pana Fall" is both...pan on top, waterfall below...it's addictive..73 bill

K1UO Larry

with Panafall and "averaging" you can have the Panadapter on top to view as usual plus the added benefit of seeing ,on the Waterfall portion, a longer lasting trace. Very weak signals are much more easily spotted in the Waterfall than the Panadapter. Plus it leaves a longer lasting trace in case you missed the first bit of activity on the Panadapter side of the Panafall. Just click on the trace to put you on the frequency of interest. Once you see it you wont go back to just a plain Panadapter view.

Ken - NM9P

The best setting I found on PSDR was Panfall with averaging, NO fill under the panadapter trace. Yes, it was very addicting, and very helpful. The averaged pan let me see the frequency components of a station's signal, and the slow Waterfall underneath let me see the "band history" of signals over time and let me see who was on, and how strong they were. It kept me from missing a lot of stations because my eyes were on another part of the display. Quite a powerful combination of features, especially when I could define the parameters of the averaging (time & duration, etc) .

Tim K8XS

Thank you Tim.

Bill Heinzinger

Thank you I'll give it a try. What do you set the Averaging and Update Period at. pse et tu