[jwr]

> the gulf between ham radio and modern RF comms is truly vast

Especially if you consider modern cellular radios. Your phone has a completely separate powerful computer just for handling the radio (we still call this a modem for some reason), with a large software stack running.

As for modulation, starting with LTE and turbo coding, we are now near the maximum theoretical channel capacity (Shannon limit), which is mind-blowing.

Learning the basics of radio is still worth the effort (and great fun!), but the gap is indeed huge.

[ACCount37]

I did some LTE work. Nasty stuff. And 5G is even worse.

[vetrom]

I don't think most people really understand the compute complexity required for LTE and 5G terminals. It's telling that pretty much every discrete-ish full-speed LTE or 5G modem I've lain eyes upon is actually an embedded SBC running its own OS, with attendant power requirements.

[ACCount37]

The companies do that because by far the largest market for LTE/5G modems is smartphones.

They could make a more cut-down modem chip, but why would they? They already make hundreds of millions on smartphone SoCs. Just rebadge that silicon as modem ICs, no one cares that an LTE stick runs full Android.