Flex 6000 on a $79 Win8 Tablet

EA4GLI

Say what you want of Ver 1.4 of SmartSDR. I just love it. I can use a $79 Win8 HP Stream7 tablet to run the radio from the confort of my sofa!!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YF5h6ErMsKs

Steve Walker

Nice just ordered one from Microsoft for £49.99 in the UK, should be here this week!

EA4GLI

Hi Steve.

I haven't done much operating with it, but it looks to run smooth with one panadapter. It is 1280x800 resolution, so the controls do not scale on the right side of SmartSDR, but for the price, you cannot beat it, even if you just use it to listen.

It works on transmit without problem. Can't wait to eventually get one tablet in the 9 to 10 inch range with windows 10 and 1920x1080 resolution. If I find one for $200 or less I am set!

Lee - N2LEE

I hear the battery life on this thing is pretty bad.

Ross - K9COX

That is less than a video card some are saying you need to buy.

Jim Gilliam

Slowly but surely the paradigm of Flex is infiltrating the way we operate Amateur radio.

Steve W6SDM

I have a HP Stream 8 on the way that I had planned to use as the GPS in my off road rig.  I might have to order a second one.  What are you using for the mic and speakers,  the internal ones?

By the way, I love your video.  That could be a Flex commercial.

Michael - N5TGL

Got a link to the one you ordered?  I wonder if it will be upgradable to Win10?

EA4GLI

Hi hi. I had the kids screaming in the background so I picked one of the youtube songs instead of the original soundtrack.

EA4GLI

http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/m...

Michael - N5TGL

Thanks Salvador for the link.    I was hoping that Steve would show me what link he used because when I look on microsoft UK, I only see it for £74.99.

EA4GLI

This was more of a proof of concept than anything else. The fact that SmartSDR runs on a $79 tablet speaks volumes of the work flex did with v. 1.4 I would recommend to get a 64 bit and 9 -10 inch screen win8.1 or wait for a win10 tablet this summer.

EA4GLI

Look at the bottom of the page for different countries for the msoft store website.

Michael - N5TGL

Yep.  I'm on the UK MSFT site, and it's  £74.99, not the  £49.99 that Steve mentioned.  Maybe he caught it on sale and I missed it.

Steve W6SDM

Here is the one that I ordered.  I paid a little extra to get the 8-inch and 4G connectivity, which I can use when  I am off road.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NSHLUFQ/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I agree with Salvador - the fact that we can run our radio on an inexpensive little tablet should have other radio manufacturers running for the drawing board.

EA4GLI

A cool option is the lenovo thinkpad 8 http://www.amazon.com/Lenovo-ThinkPad-8-Tablet-20BN000UUS/dp/B00I9ZR5Y2#featureBulletsAndDetailBullets_secondary_view_div_1427645250274 But we are talking about almost $400. I think windows 10 will bring 1080hd tablets under $200. I will wait and see....

Jim Gilliam

Thanks everyone for their input on this thread. I had no idea there were so many tablets out there that ran Windows.

Jim, K6QE

Steve Walker

I got it from Microsoft here http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msuk/en_GB/pdp/HP-Stream-7-Signature-Edition-Tablet/productID.30... if that is any help. It now shows as out of stock but it did before I placed an order and was available for a while. I am going to assume lady luck is needed to grab them where available.

73 Steve

AA0KM

Here is my set up Intel Core i3-2330M  2.2 GHz  duo-core
 Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium
RAM: 8 GB
ssd-128
Graphics Card: Intel HD Graphics 3000
Screen Size: 15.6 inches Laptop

========================

I can only run one panadapter and have to reduce the FPS and AVG on the display small as it will

go to get smoothed audio out on transmission. So these little 80 dollar tablets that are newer than my

 4 year old $600 laptop seem to work better on transmit? hum....

I have redone this laptop from scratch and all intel driver's are fully updated.

I can now run all 4 RX (6500) panadapter at once now on 1.4 version as couldn't before.

But just only one while transmitting with reduced settings.

Just my observations.

I'll wait till I hear Windows Tablets being used on the air before I make assumptions of buying one.

73 Jeff my 2 Ct's

EA4GLI

IMPORTANT. I don't think these sub $100 tablets will give you a great experience running SmartSDR. It was just to point out a proof-of-concept. Microsoft offers 1TB of OneDrive, 1 year of Office 365 Personal and 60 minutes per month of Skype calls to landlines. All of these included with the purchase of the tablet. I currently pay $99 for 1TB of Dropbox. I bought the tablet because it is an awesome deal for services I would pay for without the tablet.

My surprise was to be able to run SmartSDR v.1.4 AT ALL on such a cheap device.

I DO NOT RECOMMEND it as your main interface with your Flex radio.

I just want to make sure everyone understand this.

I run my Flex radio on two 24 HD monitors on a Corei7 with 16GB of memory and a 1GB dedicated NVIDIA video card.  

Ross - K9COX

I feel better now. I have a $40 1GB AMD video card that works fine driving dual monitors.

Steve K9ZW

I would be very interested in a reduced version of SmartSDR tailored for a near-disposable Tablet if FRS were to offer it.  Would be worth $$ to me to have the option.

Easily duplicated your effort on a very inexpensive WinBook.  Think it has less processing power than an oven timer!!  

https://k9zw.wordpress.com/2015/03/29/running-flex-6300-smartsdr-1-4-0-qsos-from-a-winbook-with-a-ab...

73

Steve
K9ZW

Michael - N5TGL

Thanks Steve.  Clicked the link and was taken to the £74.99 tablet that I saw earlier.  I guess you got lucky, that was one heck of a deal!!

EA4GLI

Michael, try clearing the cookies on the browser and then follow Steve's link.

Michael - N5TGL

Salvador, I'm going to the right link, as it shows out of stock like Steve just reported.  I've never been to MSFT UK on my work machine, so no need to clear cookies.

EA4GLI

OK Great. It was worth a try. Sometimes website (travel sites mostly) do that to increase price.

Lee - N2LEE

What would be cool is if you could run SmartSDR on the new Intel Windows Dongle.



http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/01/intels-compute-stick-is-a-full-windows-or-linux-pc-in-an-hdmi...

Ken - NM9P

Very interesting.  All you would need is a bluetooth keyboard & mouse, and a MIDI DJ Controller plugged in and you are good to go!  That is....if it has enough power to run it....!

GI4FZD

Is the remote audio working ok? I have a similar tablet the Connect 7 from a well known uk supermarket, everything works 100% except the remote audio button doesn't seem to direct the audio from the 6300 over the network, it remains playing on the 6300 speaker. Anybody tried a Hudl?
Cheers
Paul
GI4FZD

EA4GLI

Make sure you check the default recording and playback devices. After the smartsdr install they changed to the dax rx8 and tx8 when it should be speakers and mic.

GI4FZD

it started to work fine after windows did an update on this new tablet..thanks for your help..so the Connect 7 at £59 is a good alternative if the hp is out of stock. cheers Paul