I have a special early edition DVD of the movie Koyaanisqatsi, autographed by director Godfrey Reggio. I thought that if I had a DVD without copy protection, that would be it, and I was apparently correct; however, my first naive attempt to create an MP4 file to play on the SM-616 had some problems — jumpy and no sound.
I solved those problems, and here are the steps I used to make a working file:
Continue readingThe first thing I noticed about the package, the product and the manual is that there is no brand mentioned. It is a SM-616, but no Ongteed and no Semier.
The side of the box has basic product information, including one surprise. The Box and the Manual say 720P only, but the Amazon product description says 1080, more on that later on.
When I opened the latest box of Qodosen DX-286 returns from Amazon, I expected the usual: a compact LW/MW/SW/FM radio packed in its familiar product box with hard plastic case, manual, stickers, plush bag and charging cable. What I did not expect when I opened the box was this:
This was a Prime Day deal for $21.77. I ordered one yesterday (July 9). The price was just too low to pass up. And for proof of the deal, this is a snip from my Amazon invoice:
Perhaps others thought the same because today there are only 17 left in stock and although it is still Prime Day, the price jumped to $32.99.
It is essentially a multimedia player with a 7″ color screen, an MP3 music player, an MP4 video player, a Bluetooth speaker and a radio, supporting FM 87.5-108MHz , AM 520-1730 kHz, SW 4.75-21.95 MHz.
Continue readingIf you’re interested in starting to listen to shortwave radio, there are some notable deals on Amazon.com during their Prime Day promotion. And no, I don’t get any commission on products I mention here.
A firmware update was released for the ATS Mini earlier today (July 1, 2025) and I quickly grabbed it and installed it on my V3 and V1 models. The latest version is always found on GitHub here.
There are two installation files, one with OSPI in the zip filename and one with QSPI. For the commercial AST Mini products, the OSPI firmware is the correct one. One of the features of V2.28 is support for PSRAM and this is the reason for two versions. Copilot says: 🤖”PSRAM stands for Pseudo-Static RAM. It’s a type of external memory that behaves like SRAM (fast, byte-addressable) but is built using DRAM internally, making it cheaper and denser.”
If you’re up for opening your unit, this table is helpful:
The item in the left column should match the component on the circuit board, and then the PRSAM type is either Quad (use QSPI) or Octal (use OSPI). Mine says N16R8.
For a technical description of which firmware to install see: Firmware Files.
There are multiple ways to update the ATS Mini firmware, but I’ve always used the Flash Download Tool that I’m comfortable with.
The one complaint I’ve had about the ATS Mini, and one I posted as an issue on GitHub, is that the 200 kHz step on the VHF (FM) band forced even multiple of 1o0 kHz, so that the FM channels tuned were 90.0, 90.2, 90.4 rather than 90.1, 90,3, 90.5 where the actual channels are in North America. The reply I got from the developers was “Fixed in main.” I wasn’t sure what “main” was and when the fix would be available, but now I know: it’s fixed in 2.28.
One interesting change is described as: Much better seek sensitivity. The other was a fix to “Fix loud clicks when changing bands/modes on the PCB version without the mute circuit.” I haven’t observed the problem.
I’ve flashed the firmware enough times that I don’t need to refer to the documentation. Updating two radios takes maybe 10 minutes not hurrying (longer if I hurry). Of course, I already have the firmware download tool on the hard drive.
Turning the encoder knob advances to page 3, which shows a nonzero value for PSRAM.
