Try this document for a quick explanation of how it works:
http://www.wetterlin.org/sam/SA/MSAOverview.pdfI agree the main site is a bit disorganized. This site has
a lot more information on it:
http://www.wetterlin.org/sam/I highly recommend joining the Yahoo group:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/spectrumanalyzer/I joined the list and found someone offering a group buy
of the PCBs so I got those. Then someone offered a group
buy of the components so I got those too :-)
I'm finding doing the mechanical construction to be the
hardest for me. I wasn't sure I could ever build the cavity
filter correctly, but then someone in Australia (not Dave)
offered to do a run on filters on his wife's kitchen stove, so
I jumped on that offer too.
Then there was a group buy for the SMA (RF) connectors and I've
been scouring Ebay for the hardline cables to connect this all up.
I'm seriously analog challenged, so I only partly understand the
theory behind all of this, but reading some of the documents on
Sam's site as well as Scotty's has helped. And you can always
ask on the Yahoo group. They have been very helpful.
If I could have found a spectrum analyzer on Ebay that worked
for a decent price, I would have, but all I can find in my price
range are repair units, and I think there's too much analog
mojo for me to have confidence in fixing these. Plus I've heard
some are *very* difficult to fix.
Scott