[jacquesm]

That's so hilarious. I've had a couple that went in that direction but nothing to come close.

To be fair though, there is a lot of tech that to me seems like complete magic and yet it exists. SDR for instance, still has me baffled. Who ever thought you'd simply digitize the antenna signal and call it a day, hardware wise, the rest is just math, after all.

When you get used to enough miracles like that without actually understanding any of it and suddenly the impossible might just sound reasonable.

> Can't you do something creative? We heard you were clever.

Should be chiseled in marble.

[bborud]

The purely digital neighborhood of the SDRs is much easier to explain than the analog rat droppings between the DAC/ADC and the antenna. That part belongs to dark wizards with costly instruments that draw unsettling polar plots, and whose only consistent output is a request for even pricier gear from companies whose names sound an awful lot like European folk duos.

The digital end of SDRs are simple. Sample it, then once you have trapped the signal in digital form beat the signal into submission with the stick labeled "linear algebra".

(Nevermind that the math may be demanding. Math books are nowhere near as scary as the Sacred Texts Of The Dark Wizards)

"Rohde & Schwarz — live at the VNA, 96 dB dynamic range, one night only."

[jacquesm]

> whose names sound an awful lot like European folk duos.

That had me laughing out loud, you should have left the name out to make it more of a puzzler :)

I apparently have been drawn to the occult for a long time and feel more comfortable with coils, capacitors and transmission lines than I do with the math behind them. Of course it's great to be able to just say 'ridiculously steep bandpass filter here' and expect it to work but I know that building that same thing out of discrete components - even if the same math describes it - would run into various very real limitations soon.

And here I am on a budget SDR speccing a 10 Hz bandfilter and it just works. I know there must be some downside to this but for the life of me I can't find it.

[defrost]

> I know there must be some downside to this but for the life of me I can't find it.

Literally Goethe's Faust (A Tragedy, Part I) .. you're good unless a poodle transforms into Mephistopheles on your deathbed.

[jacquesm]

I knew it ;)