[Elecraft] Elecraft KX3 IQ out and spectral display pograms

[Chris Tate - N6WM]

Ok.  This issue has been resolved.

First I want to send a huge Thanks to K9YC for his body of work on RFI, and bonding , as well as W3FPR for setting me straight where I should be reading on the pan adapter and soundcard isses.   I spent some quality time, along with an offline email (thanks Jim) and ended up bonding all equipment, laptop, KX3, basically any chassis.  Since this is an expedition kit, I took his advice and built  pigtails with power pole connectors connected to each chassis in the setup.  This allows quick assembly and breakdown of the bonding system.  After doing this First result.. all audible rfi noise in headphones.. gone.  Voltage between devices seems to have been balanced.  Spot on Jim. This was great, and it gets better.

The noise I was seeing on waterfalls seems to be nastiness coming from the USB system on the laptop.  I did some snooping with an HT to narrow this down.  I applied a ferrite choke onto the USB cable along with ensuring a very secure connection to the USB port.. fired up the system and bingo..  98% of the displayed noise on the waterfall is gone. (I am not sure if the Choke worked or if it was a loose connection, or both).

Lessons learned..
1.  Read the Elecraft Manual.  Carefully.
2.  Read K9YC presentation and data  Carefully.  Raise your hands and say.. "You are the go to man for this Reverend Jim!"
3.  Read telepost soundcard page.  Read it again.  Thanks again Don.. They have really added a lot of info since the last time I looked there.
4.  Reach out to the authors as needed to reassure yourself what you read is true :-).  (I guess it's a ham thing.. or maybe an N6WM thing hi hi)

Net result (with all these little challenges solved) is  I have the best sounding fully functional compact expedition/portable contestpedition setup that can fit in a pelican case(in my opinion.) 

 Consists of KX3/KXPA100  Thinkpad notebook, mini speakers, small power supply, Xonar sound card, footswitch(tested and working) , headphones(CM500 tx audio dialed in), budipole and battery for the really remote stuff.  With the IQ out into the Xonar , I have skimmer, N1MM Plus, and even power SDR running in a stable state giving a full waterfall display of my choosing.  In fact I have them running all simultaneously.  The entire setup works, and works well.

Now I can pack all this stuff up and get back to planning its first travel date, and  using my K3/0 connected to my "not on expedition" K-line at the hilltop station. 

Thanks K9YC and everyone else who responded.. this was a fun project... and of course keep cranking out these super cool products Eric and Wayne!

~Chris
N6WM