For those who are coming to this post, having just got their SDR and having some issues: Please see the bottom of this post for helpful links. Be sure to grab the latest PothosSDR build as it has patches for SoapySDR that appear to be required.
First off, I’d like to say I have been happily/furiously playing/fighting with my device for nearly 8 hours now and here’s some of the issues I’ve ran into.
Most links strewn about the redirected limesdr.org landing page point to horribly outdated or flat out incorrect information. Unless you stumble on the root MyriadRF github right off the bat, you will undoubtedly end up with old drivers and Lime Suite GUI. Not only that, but from the available documentation, users will be under the impression that Lime Suite will automatically download and update firmware. It’s quite the mess.
Now, to the issues I’m currently experiencing:
I have acquired the latest Lime Suite. I have removed the drivers that I hand massaged into working with the revised device ID and installed the new signed drivers. I have also flashed the new gateware/firmware/what-have-you for both the cypress and altera chips.
I’ve had several odd behaviors from SoapySDRUtil and Lime Suite through this process, but after all this, I’m back to the same behavior as I had out of the box. Lime Suite will enumerate the device and connect to it, I can run calibration with varying degrees of success usually, and can occasionally get the FFT module to display a live feed. Unfortunately this live feed is of nothing of importance and does not change with different parameters, and that’s assuming LS doesn’t just crash. In addition to that, the “Read Temp” button usually reports a semi-random temp, ranging from 130C to +1000C and only seems to stabilize after LS has had the FFT running for a bit.
SoapySDRUtil will enumerate the devices, but when I “probe” or “make” the utility throws an error with a call to setBandwidth(Rx, 0, 30 MHz). The error being CFB_TIA_RFE step size out of range. Error probing device: CFB_TIA_RFE step size out of range.
I’m in contact with several people who are expecting their early bird units to arrive within days and am hoping to have most of the issues worked out before then to save them the headache.
Edit:
MyriadRF Github
Download all drivers, firmware, gateware, Lime Suite GUI from here. Any other sources are outdated.
PothosSDR Wiki
Download links are on the right hand side.
Lime Suite User Guide
A little outdated, but useful for flashing new gateware and the like.
LimeSDR User Guide
Also currently a little outdated, but might give you some insight into the blinking lights.
The team is currently working on getting links updated and producing a more accurate “Quick Setup Guide” that helps in understanding the bare minimum to test the hardware and possibly use other SDR software, once a few more issues are resolved. I can post links to this guide along with the software required for a quick start, assuming I get the go ahead from the team. I don’t want to release any documents I don’t have approval for.