No spectrum/waterfally?

Rhett Aultman

Hi, all,

I'm changing around my home lab and changing which machine I use my Flex with.  I've noticed that, while my laptop never had much trouble with my Flex on direct connection, LAN, or wifi, it's a somewhat different story for my workstation.  After much fiddling and fussing, it will connect to my Flex, but then the stragest thing happens.

Basically, I can hear audio, the s-meter moves roughly correctly, and I can tune the receive frequency, but I have no spectrum graph and waterfall.  This leaves me thinking it's got to be one of a few things.  It's either a network setting I've missed, SmartSDR doesn't play nice with my hardware graphics acceleration, or generic user idiocy on my part.

I'm guessing it's not a network issue.  I see lots of UDP traffic flowing on ports 4991-4993.  I know I've got some kind of bidirectional connection, because I can change receive frequencies.

Anyone else run into this one before?

Best,
Rhett

Ria

I have seen this occasionally. In extreme cases you'll have to power cycle the radio but usually close and restart SmartSDR fixes it. If it happens via SmartLink that is a different issue where fragmented packets are being dropped by a firewall or router. In that case you will have to try another network which doesn't filter out fragmented packets.

Ria

Rhett Aultman

This is definitely not via Smartlink; purely over my home network setup.  I nicked a wifi dongle from another machine in the house to try out with my workstation, and I was able to get the spectrum and waterfall to display just fine using the client wifi.

I'm wondering if maybe I'm not running into an issue similar to what Smartlink users are experiencing though, because the current home network path is Flex -> Ethernet -> main router -> Ethernet -> bridged point-to-point-wifi -> switch -> Ethernet -> workstation.  If the packets are getting fragmented, then they might be getting dropped by either the boxes doing the wifi bridging or the switch.  The slightly happy news there is that my company makes that equipment, so I can ask around about that.

K3DCW

Double-check your firewall settings on the new PC. You have to allow the programs (DAX, CAT, and SmartSDR) through the firewall or else you get the precise symptoms you describe. 

Don't ask how I learned this...

Rhett Aultman

I don't have a local firewall on that machine, so it should be ok on that front. That squares with my finding that I could work just fine on a WiFi dongle from that machine. I'm guessing either the wifi mesh bridge or the switch are the culprit.

Butch

After you start SmartSDR, close your SmartSDR DAX and SmartSDR CAT programs, then restart them.  If this method works for you, I suggest removing the DAX and CAT programs from your Startup folder, and just start them manually each time you SmartSDR.

K3DCW

What OS are you running?

Rhett Aultman

Windows. I keep Windows Defender off.

K3DCW

I believe in WIndows 10 that Defender and the Firewall are configured separately.  At least it is worth a check.  

Rhett Aultman

Moving my Flex onto the same switch as my workstation resolves the issue, so it's likely not a local firewall.  I'm guessing one of the pieces of equipment in the middle, either the wifi mesh bridge or another switch, was the culprit.  That's fine for my purposes, though, since I'll likely keep the Flex in my office anyway.

Rhett Aultman

Thanks for the tip.  In this case, it looks like it was an issue with local network toplogy; likely the wifi mesh bridge from the cable modem to my office.  Putting the Flex on the same switch as the workstation showed no issues.

Tim - W4TME

I agree with that assessment