1 .. SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0
3 The Radiotrack radio driver
4 ===========================
6 Author: Stephen M. Benoit <benoits@servicepro.com>
13 This document was made based on 'C' code for Linux from Gideon le Grange
14 (legrang@active.co.za or legrang@cs.sun.ac.za) in 1994, and elaborations from
15 Frans Brinkman (brinkman@esd.nl) in 1996. The results reported here are from
16 experiments that the author performed on his own setup, so your mileage may
17 vary... I make no guarantees, claims or warranties to the suitability or
18 validity of this information. No other documentation on the AIMS
19 Lab (http://www.aimslab.com/) RadioTrack card was made available to the
20 author. This document is offered in the hopes that it might help users who
21 want to use the RadioTrack card in an environment other than MS Windows.
26 I have a RadioTrack card from back when I ran an MS-Windows platform. After
27 converting to Linux, I found Gideon le Grange's command-line software for
28 running the card, and found that it was good! Frans Brinkman made a
29 comfortable X-windows interface, and added a scanning feature. For hack
30 value, I wanted to see if the tuner could be tuned beyond the usual FM radio
31 broadcast band, so I could pick up the audio carriers from North American
32 broadcast TV channels, situated just below and above the 87.0-109.0 MHz range.
33 I did not get much success, but I learned about programming ioports under
34 Linux and gained some insights about the hardware design used for the card.
36 So, without further delay, here are the details.
42 The RadioTrack card is an ISA 8-bit FM radio card. The radio frequency (RF)
43 input is simply an antenna lead, and the output is a power audio signal
44 available through a miniature phone plug. Its RF frequencies of operation are
45 more or less limited from 87.0 to 109.0 MHz (the commercial FM broadcast
46 band). Although the registers can be programmed to request frequencies beyond
47 these limits, experiments did not give promising results. The variable
48 frequency oscillator (VFO) that demodulates the intermediate frequency (IF)
49 signal probably has a small range of useful frequencies, and wraps around or
50 gets clipped beyond the limits mentioned above.
53 CONTROLLING THE CARD WITH IOPORT
54 --------------------------------
56 The RadioTrack (base) ioport is configurable for 0x30c or 0x20c. Only one
57 ioport seems to be involved. The ioport decoding circuitry must be pretty
58 simple, as individual ioport bits are directly matched to specific functions
59 (or blocks) of the radio card. This way, many functions can be changed in
60 parallel with one write to the ioport. The only feedback available through
61 the ioports appears to be the "Stereo Detect" bit.
63 The bits of the ioport are arranged as follows:
68 +------+------+------+--------+--------+-------+---------+--------+
69 | VolA | VolB | ???? | Stereo | Radio | TuneA | TuneB | Tune |
70 | (+) | (-) | | Detect | Audio | (bit) | (latch) | Update |
71 | | | | Enable | Enable | | | Enable |
72 +------+------+------+--------+--------+-------+---------+--------+
75 ==== ==== =================================
77 ==== ==== =================================
79 0 1 volume + (some delay required)
80 1 0 volume - (some delay required)
81 1 1 stay at present volume
82 ==== ==== =================================
84 ==================== ===========
85 Stereo Detect Enable Description
86 ==================== ===========
89 ==================== ===========
91 Results available by reading ioport >60 msec after last port write.
93 0xff ==> no stereo detected, 0xfd ==> stereo detected.
95 ============================= =============================
96 Radio to Audio (path) Enable Description
97 ============================= =============================
98 0 Disable path (silence)
99 1 Enable path (audio produced)
100 ============================= =============================
102 ===== ===== ==================
103 TuneA TuneB Description
104 ===== ===== ==================
105 0 0 "zero" bit phase 1
106 0 1 "zero" bit phase 2
107 1 0 "one" bit phase 1
108 1 1 "one" bit phase 2
109 ===== ===== ==================
112 24-bit code, where bits = (freq*40) + 10486188.
113 The Most Significant 11 bits must be 1010 xxxx 0x0 to be valid.
114 The bits are shifted in LSb first.
116 ================== ===========================
117 Tune Update Enable Description
118 ================== ===========================
119 0 Tuner held constant
120 1 Tuner updating in progress
121 ================== ===========================
129 Default: BASE <-- 0xc8 (current volume, no stereo detect,
130 radio enable, tuner adjust disable)
132 Card Off: BASE <-- 0x00 (audio mute, no stereo detect,
133 radio disable, tuner adjust disable)
135 Card On: BASE <-- 0x00 (see "Card Off", clears any unfinished business)
136 BASE <-- 0xc8 (see "Default")
138 Volume Down: BASE <-- 0x48 (volume down, no stereo detect,
139 radio enable, tuner adjust disable)
141 BASE <-- 0xc8 (see "Default")
143 Volume Up: BASE <-- 0x88 (volume up, no stereo detect,
144 radio enable, tuner adjust disable)
146 BASE <-- 0xc8 (see "Default")
148 Check Stereo: BASE <-- 0xd8 (current volume, stereo detect,
149 radio enable, tuner adjust disable)
151 x <-- BASE (read ioport)
152 BASE <-- 0xc8 (see "Default")
154 x=0xff ==> "not stereo", x=0xfd ==> "stereo detected"
156 Set Frequency: code = (freq*40) + 10486188
157 foreach of the 24 bits in code,
158 (from Least to Most Significant):
159 to write a "zero" bit,
160 BASE <-- 0x01 (audio mute, no stereo detect, radio
161 disable, "zero" bit phase 1, tuner adjust)
162 BASE <-- 0x03 (audio mute, no stereo detect, radio
163 disable, "zero" bit phase 2, tuner adjust)
164 to write a "one" bit,
165 BASE <-- 0x05 (audio mute, no stereo detect, radio
166 disable, "one" bit phase 1, tuner adjust)
167 BASE <-- 0x07 (audio mute, no stereo detect, radio
168 disable, "one" bit phase 2, tuner adjust)