retronet-discuss June 2024

discussion@lists.retronetworking.org

2 participants
4 discussions

Using RPi5 with icE1usb, 2xE1
by Mychaela Falconia 23 Jun '24

23 Jun '24

Hello fellow retronetworkers, I am now looking into possibly using icE1usb to talk to my Nokia TRAU. My original was to use a Digium PCI card, but I ran into issues: a) The only machine I have with a PCI slot is a production machine; b) My naive hope that DAHDI would "just work" did not pan out; c) Deeper troubleshooting would require subjecting this production machine to more downtime than allowable. Hence I am looking at the alternative of using icE1usb instead. There is one sticking point though: unlike a BTS, playing with a TRAU requires a minimum of two E1 circuits, one for A i/f and one for Ater. And I know that few host systems can drive icE1usb with both interfaces in terms of USB limitations. However, this page says that Raspberry Pi 5 should do the trick: https://osmocom.org/projects/e1-t1-adapter/wiki/Isochronous_USB_Issues I am thinking about getting an RPi5 specifically for the purpose of driving icE1usb with both E1 interfaces active. The requirement of having no other USB devices will be easy to satisfy: the whole RPi5 will be just for this purpose and no other. But I would like to confirm: a) Does anyone here have actual experience with RPi5 driving both E1 interfaces on an icE1usb? b) RPi5 has two kinds of USB host ports: some USB2 and some USB3. Which would be better to use for icE1usb? TIA for any leads, M~

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Nokia TRAU update
by Mychaela Falconia 12 Jun '24

12 Jun '24

Hello fellow retronetworkers, For those of you who enjoyed my TRAU presentation last week, I got a very positive update. :) Today I got this TRAU powered up (after getting the right crimp connector parts from Digi-Key and assembling the necessary wiring harness for -48 VDC power to the box), and while I still don't have the additional hw that brings out E1 circuits, the management interface I got on the RS-232 port shows that this unit has everything we'll need to have lots of fun once those E1 connections are made: * No password lock: the mgmt interface password is the factory default that's documented in the manual. * There are 3 DSP fw images installed on the TRCO (the maximum it can hold per the docs), covering circuit types A, B and F. Circuit type F (the one it came configured with) is AMR, which is not of much interest to me (and apparently Nokia never implemented TFO for AMR in any of their TRAUs), but cfg A is 16 kbit/s FR/EFR/CSD and cfg B is 8 kbit/s HR - these are the ones I look forward to playing with. * TFO feature is present, i.e., NOT excluded or blocked by "premium feature" schemes - yay! Obviously I won't be able to confirm it actually working until I get A & Ater E1 interfaces brought out and connected to my test rig, but the option to enable/disable TFO is present and accessible in the mgmt interface, and when I set it to enabled, it shows up as such in config readback. The next step is for me to buy an ET2E module and the ET1TC chassis that holds it from shields-e (the same people from whom I bought the parts I already got), and then make my own cable with DIN 41612 connectors to connect the two backplanes - that's how we'll get the two E1 interfaces (A and Ater) out of this baby. Until then, if you are curious to see what the management i/f for the TRAU looks like, here is a log of my RS-232 session talking to the box, from power-up: https://www.freecalypso.org/members/falcon/trau/tcsm2-boot.log and here is the manual that describes this interface: https://www.freecalypso.org/pub/GSM/Nokia_TCSM/tcsm2-command.pdf Happy hacking, Mother Mychaela

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TRAU presentation tomorrow: slides ahead of time
by Mychaela Falconia 05 Jun '24

05 Jun '24

Hello retronetworking community, As Harald already announced, tomorrow (or later today in Eurasian time zones) I will be giving my first installment in what will be a series of presentation on my adventures with Nokia TRAU hardware, specifically TCSM2. In order to make better use of time during the actual RetroNetCall, I am posting my slides ahead of time: https://www.freecalypso.org/members/falcon/presentations/trau-pres1.txt https://www.freecalypso.org/members/falcon/presentations/trau-pres1.ps https://www.freecalypso.org/members/falcon/presentations/trau-pres1.pdf (Plain text -> Postscript -> PDF is my generation chain; I write in plain text, but PDF is needed for upload into BigBlueButton.) Anyone who is interested in this TRAU topic, I recommend that you read these slides ahead of time - this way I can spend less time reading the slides (or pausing for people to read them in real time), and we can have more time for the fun parts of looking at the hardware (I will be pointing my webcam at the hw) and discussing the still-outstanding challenges. See y'all tomorrow, after my sleep cycle. :) M~

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RetroNetCall on Jun 5, 2024: Nokia TCSM2 Initial examination
by Harald Welte 04 Jun '24

04 Jun '24

Dear Osmocom community, we're happy to announce the next incarnation of RetroNetCall[1], the retronetworking oriented spin-off of OsmoDevCall[2]. when: Jun 5, 2024 at 20:00 CEST where: https://osmocom.org/RetroNetCall This time, @falconia will be presenting on Nokia TCSM2, a bank of TRAUs with E1 interfaces: Part 1, initial examination of the hardware This meeting will have the following schedule: 20:00 meet + greet 20:10 presentation as outlined above 21:00 unstructured supplementary social event [3] Attendance is free of charge and open to anyone with an interest in Osmocom or open source cellular technologies. More information about RetroNetCall, including the schedule for further upcoming events can be found at https://osmocom.org/projects/retronetworking/wiki/RetroNetCall Looking forward to meeting you soon! Best regards, Harald [1] https://osmocom.org/projects/retronetworking/wiki/RetroNetCall [2] https://osmocom.org/projects/osmo-dev-con/wiki/OsmoDevCall [3] this is how we started to call the "unstructured" part of osmocom developer conferences in the past, basically where anyone can talk about anything, no formal schedule or structure. -- - Harald Welte <laforge(a)osmocom.org> http://laforge.gnumonks.org/ ============================================================================ "Privacy in residential applications is a desirable marketing option." (ETSI EN 300 175-7 Ch. A6)

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