Tablet control for Flex1500

Andrew VK5CV

The Flex 1500 is an good size and weight to carry up summits for QRP/SOTA activities. My Dell i7 laptop is not. Also the laptop battery only lasts a few hours. Running the 1500 on a Windows tablet looks attractive now at least from battery life and weight. But what is the minimum spec for PowerSDR to run reliably now and in future with enough grunt left over for digital modes? CPU, RAM, Cache, USB, SSD and screen size. Testing required.

Andrew VK5CV

I have ended up with the Toshiba Encore 8. Pictured in a past listing. It is better than a 5year old Dell core 2 duo small form factor desktop PC. Have also been able to get NMEA timing data from the GPS sensor for WSPR and WSJT timing. A great portable setup with the F1500 for all modes. Light, small with long battery life . I thought about a conventional QRP radio but the legacy radios don't have the performance of the 1500. The KX3 is getting expensive on this side of the pond.

Andrew de VK5CV

Walt - KZ1F

And, of course that is one of the 'huge' downsides of PSDR, the tablet/PC/business class machine IS the radio so it HAS to be Windows. I haven't been following the open source PSDR movement but I have to believe, now that FRS has provided development information for SSDR that PSDR will fade into obscurity.Maybe not, I am sure there are those that disagree with me on this one.  First of the year, when I actually retire, of my own volition, my first, and primary, project will be a converged non-windows control surface for SSDR, logger (LOTW), dxcluster, and following that rotor and amp control. This will appear first on Android and second on Linux. Where everything will be running on an Android tablet it is not clear there would be much incentive to do Linux.

Funny how this works:

Desktop takes 60-90 seconds to boot, good monitor(s) but anchors one to the location of the PC(s) and radio.

Laptop takes 60 - 90 seconds to boot, poor monitor, removes the anchor to the location of the radio.

SmartPhone takes 1 second to go active, totally **** monitor, removes the anchor to the location of the radio.

Tablet takes 1 second to go active, laptop class monitor, removes anchor to the location of the radio.

I suppose there is a niche for Linux desktop, no ransomware, malware, viruses. But if one can run their shack from the shack, the family room, the front porch, work, mountain top (assuming wifi access), grocery store (for Steve's rare dx contact) I think the attractiveness of the other options diminish somewhat.

Walt - kz1f