SOLD OUT. Due to chip shortages, we don't know if we will have any more in the future. Feel free to click the Notify Me button in case we are able to make more.

The receiver in the RS-HFIQ consists of 5 band-pass filters to reject out-of-band signals, an LNA with frequency dependent gain and a conventional quadrature down-converter.

The transmitter in the RS-HFIQ uses a Quatrature up-converter followed by the same band-pass filters used by the receivers, a 5W power chain and a low-pass filter bank.

The Local Oscillator is based on a Silicon Labs SI5351 chip that can product up to 3 RF outputs, the LO signal for the up/down-converter, a built-in test signal for calibrating I and Q offsets and an external signal.

The control of the SI5351 and all switching functions is provided by an Arduino Nano running open-source software and programmed with the Arduino IDE.

Special care has been taken to insure noise and ground-loop set-up. The RS-HFIQ has three separate DC isolated ground planes; RF/Chassis ground, Baseband/Audio ground and Digital ground. This allows the same PC to be connected to the audio in/out and the USB port on the Arduino Nano without creating noise/grounding issues.

5W not enough power? Add a HARDROCK-50 to your station to boost up to 50W. The RS-HFIQ and HARDROCK-50 seamlessly integrate together for a powerful base station!

Specifications

• Frequency Range - 3-30MHz (performance guaranteed on 80/60/40/30/20/17/15/12/10M ham bands)
• Sensitivity - MDS < -128 dBm on 80M dropping to < -135 on 10M (depending on processing bandwidth and sound card performance)
• Noise Figure -
• TX Power 5W typical, 4W minimum
• LO Feed-thru < -50 dBc @ 5W output
• Spurious and Harmonics < -50 dBc typical
• DC Power 13.8VDC, 2 amp max plus USB power for the Arduino Nano
• Size - 100MM x 160MM

Requirements

The RS-HFIQ is NOT a stand-alone transceiver, it is a part of a Software Defined Radio system. The SDR system consists of:

• Radio front-end - The RS-HFIQ
• Data conversion - Analog to Digital and Digital to Analog typically provided by a high-quality sound card
• Computer hardware - A digital signal processor or high speed general purpose processor.
• SDR Software - to process TX and RX signals

While many different configurations are possible and even encouraged, we have developed a 'standard' configuration that will help users new to SDR's go up and running quickly. To get on the air with the RS-HFIQ in the standard configuration you will need:

• RS-HFIQ
• StarTech - 96 KSPS sound card
• Windows PC - running Windows 7, 8 or 10 with speakers and two available USB ports
• 13.8V 3A power supply
• Microphone
• Various USB and audio cables
• HDSDR and Omni-Rig software
• A valid Amateur Radio license is required for transmitting
• Antenna system

Visit the RS-HFIQ Transceiver Wiki for more information.