FM radio reception on neo/openmoko and some other questions

Doug Sutherland doug at proficio.ca
Fri Nov 9 12:46:16 CET 2007


Silicon Labs SI4700 and SI4701 are entire FM tuners on a single
chip, and they are tiny. I have their USB FM Radio and I use it
every day on my PC, and I believe the same chip is in my Sony
Ericsson phone. This is the one that uses the earphone wire as
antenna, although it can be separate, as is demonstrated in the
USB FM radio implementation and also their devkit. The 4701
adds European Radio Data System (RDS)  and US Radio
Broadcast Data System (RBDS) which can capture the station
identification and song name. This FM tuner would be a good
choice for Neo. Silicon Labs also has an even smaller version,
AM/FM version, and also FM transmitter chips that would
allow playback on car stereo for example.

I am planning to make some PCB boards with the SI4701 and
minimal parts on them in the future, will be sold on ebay
(I have surface mount reflow oven).

See the Silicon Labs parts here:
http://www.silabs.com/tgwWebApp/public/web_content/products/Broadcast/Radio_Tuners/en/Si4730-31_matrix.htm

  -- Doug





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