I have been wanting get a software defined radio for some time.  I have many radios and it just didn’t make sense for me to spend any more money on a new run of mill analog radio that I would have to replace after a few years due to the forward march of technology.

With  a Software Defined Radio I had high hopes that I could acquire future technological changes via software updates.

I had pined many times after one of the Flex Radios, Win Radios or in my more adventurous moments putting together one of the HPSDR from the TAPR group.  As a computer programmer both professionally and as a hobbyist I was very interested in that aspect as well so the FlexRadio design really appealed to me but alas I waited too long and they were priced out of my reach.

The RFSpace radio is very affordable and also basically open source for the API and software.   So it became my second choice.   But it turns out that the SDRIQ is a fairly scarce commodity.  So on one of my many trips to my local Ham Radio store I happend to spot them in stock I jumped on the chance to own this cutting edge piece of hardware.

Software Defined Radios are slowly evolving many of the Analog and Digital hybrid radio systems that we have all come to love.  Here are some interesting links to what others are thinking about this field.

Too many Radios in our consumer devices…

http://gigaom.com/2008/07/21/more-radios-on-fewer-chips/

Here is one of the many things Intel is thinking on this subject….
http://www.electronicsweekly.com/Articles/2007/12/11/42781/intel-targets-wimax-with-software-radio-device.htm