Ramsey Electronics CUBE 2000 User manual

Ramsey Electronics Model No. C2000
Transmits perfect video - and you can hide it under a quarter!
Fully assembled, just add a camera and battery for a complete
hide-it-anywhere video transmitter! A few years ago, only the
CIA or the KGB had anything like this!
•Great for transmitting from the baby’s room throughout the house
•Tiny enough with battery and CCD camera to hide into a pack of
cigarettes or even a pager !
•Easy hook-up to any CCD video camera - Color or Black & White
•Operates on Cable TV channel 59 - receive it on any cable ready TV
or handheld / portable TV set !
•Superior performance - transmits up to 150 feet with small antenna
or use better receiving antenna for up to 1/4 mile !
•Unit runs on 9 volts DC; a 9 volt alkaline battery works well!
•Works great with our mini-peeper series of CCD Video camera
modules !
•Dielectric resonator for fantastic frequency stability - no drifting or
tuning !
CUBE 2000
WORLD’S SMALLEST
HIGH POWER TV
TRANSMITTER KIT

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PARTIAL LIST OF AVAILABLE KITS
RAMSEY TRANSMITTER KITS
• FM25B FM Stereo Transmitter
• AM1, AM25 AM Transmitters
• TV6 Television Transmitter
• FM100B Professional FM Stereo
Transmitter
RAMSEY RECEIVER KITS
• FR1 FM Broadcast Receiver
• AR1 Aircraft Band Receiver
• SR2 Shortwave Receiver
• AA7 Active Antenna
• SC1 Shortwave Converter
RAMSEY HOBBY KITS
• SG7 Personal Speed Radar
• SS70A Speech Scrambler
• MX5, MX-10 Mixers
• MD3 Microwave Motion Detector
• PH10 Peak hold Meter
• STC1 Stereo Transmitter Companion
RAMSEY AMATEUR RADIO KITS
• DDF1 Doppler Direction Finder
• HR Series HF All Mode Receivers
• QRP Series HF CW Transmitters
• CW7 CW Keyer
• CPO3 Code Practice Oscillator
• QRP Power Amplifiers
RAMSEY MINI-KITS
Many other kits are available for hobby, school, scouts and just plain FUN. New
kits are always under development. Write or call for our free Ramsey catalog.
C2000 THE CUBE MICRO-MINIATURE TV TRANSMITTER INSTRUCTION MANUAL
Ramsey Electronics publication No. MC2000 Revision 1.1
First printing: December 1997
COPYRIGHT 1997 by Ramsey Electronics, Inc. 590 Fishers Station Drive, Victor, New York
14564. All rights reserved. No portion of this publication may be copied or duplicated without the
written permission of Ramsey Electronics, Inc. Printed in the United States of America.

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CUBE 2000
TV TRANSMITTER
Ramsey Publication No. MC2000
Manual Price Only $5.00
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction to the C2000 ..............................4
Hook-up .........................................................4
Using the Cube 2000.....................................6
Troubleshooting.............................................8
Ramsey Warranty........................................11
INSTRUCTION MANUAL FOR

C2000 •4
INTRODUCTION
Your Cube 2000 uses the latest in monolithic circuitry to produce
a very tiny, yet full featured TV transmitter capable of excellent image
quality. Frequency stability is excellent due to the use of advanced
dielectric resonator technology. Wide bandwidth modulation allows
transmission of high resolution color or black and white video. Wireless
transmission range of up to 150 feet is possible to any standard cable
ready TV set. Using a top quality UHF TV receiving antenna can
increase range up to 1/2 mile! The Cube is so small that it can be
used in applications only James Bond could imagine. A Ramsey CCD
camera, battery and The Cube will easily fit into a cigarette pack,
baseball cap or other small enclosure.
HOOK-UP
Hook up of The Cube is very easy
requiring the connection of just a few wires to the Cube’s solder pad
areas. You must use a small pencil type soldering iron such as our
Weller WLC-100 or Radio Shack pencil iron. The component side of
the circuit board has been encapsulated to protect the precision
adjustments and specialized open chip circuits inside. You will need to
solder your camera video and ground wires and your Cube power
supply wires to the Cube 2000. Ramsey cameras need to run on their
own 12 volt DC supply. The following PC board diagram shows where
the connections will be soldered.
BE SURE TO OBSERVE PROPER BATTERY POLARITY AND
CAMERA WIRE LEAD COLORS! FAILURE TO DO SO CAN
DAMAGE YOUR CUBE AND CCD CAMERA - AN EXPENSIVE
MISTAKE! Double check all your work before applying power.
Cable ready TV tuned to
cable channel 59
9V Battery
Pack
The Cube
CCD Camera
12V Battery
Pack

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1. Solder the Cube’s 9 volt positive battery wire to the solder pad
labeled "RED" on the Cube and the negative 9 volt battery wire
to the pad labeled "BLK" on the Cube.
2. Your camera should have three wires; Red (power +), Black
(ground), Yellow (video). If you have a non-Ramsey camera,
check the paperwork with the camera to be sure which wire
colors indicate positive, negative and video. The Red wire (+)
on your Ramsey camera connects to the 12 volt battery pack
positive. BE SURE YOU’RE CONNECTING TO THE
BATTERY POSITIVE BEFORE SOLDERING!
3. The camera 12 volt battery pack ground must be connected to
the camera and the Cube. The black camera wire is connected
directly to the battery negative or ground (-). Again, double
check the polarity.
4. The black camera wire, now connected to the battery negative
or ground connection (-), must also be connected to the pad
labeled “BLK” on the Cube.
5. The Yellow camera wire (video) connects to the pad labeled
YEL".
When you're finished, check your work to be sure that everything is
connected correctly and the solder pads are not shorted together by a
"blob" of solder. Read the rest of the setup instructions before applying
power.
The Cube
9V Battery
Pack
+-
red
black
yellow
12V Battery
Pack
+-
red
CCD
C
amera
video out
camera power "+" input
camera power "-" input
black
black
+-

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USING THE CUBE 2000
Since the Cube transmits on Cable channel 59, not UHF TV
channel 59, we must use a cable ready TV set up to receive cable and
not off-air standard TV. Other small hand-held (like the Sony
Watchman) and automobile TV sets with variable dial tuners (like you
see for $49.95 at Sam’s Club) are capable of tuning cable channel 59,
read on for details. Also, you may use a VCR set for cable operation
and tuned to cable channel 59. Virtually all TV sets and VCR’s made
within the last 5 years are cable ready!
Configuring your TV or VCR for Cable channel reception:
If you are currently using your TV or VCR with a cable TV system:
1) Turn your TV or VCR "off".
2) Unscrew the coax cable from the TV or VCR's antenna input jack.
3) Connect a standard UHF TV Loop or UHF Bow-tie type antenna
(available at Radio Shack) to the TV antenna input jack. If the Loop or Bow-
tie antenna does not have the same type of connector that the TV has, you
will need to get the right connector and/or coax cable. Usually the Loop or
Bow-tie antenna needs a 300 ohm to 75 ohm matching transformer and then
you can use a length of standard TV coax cable to connect to your TV. Bow-
tie antennas work very well and are only $10.00 or so and the matching
transformer is $1.00; Radio Shack has them. To test things, you can also just
poke a length of wire a few feet long into the center pin hole of the TV’s
antenna jack, but a real antenna is needed for best range!
If you are currently using your TV with an outdoor TV antenna or using
‘rabbit-ears” (receiving TV from off-air), you must configure the TV for
cable TV operation:
1) Turn your TV or VCR "on".
2) Using the TV remote control, go into the TV tuner set-up mode by
selecting ‘MENU, TUNER SET-UP, MODE, TUNER’ or some other such
selection. Your TV’s manual is handy here since we at the Ramsey factory
can’t possibly know the exact terminology used by the many different TV
sets out there!

C2000 •7
3) Navigate through the menu selections until you find the Normal TV or
Antenna / CATV, AIR / CABLE or Cable selection. Select Cable or CATV.
4) Exit the TV’s programming menu and return to regular TV operation.
5) Verify that you can still receive a local TV channel from 2 - 13, just to
make sure you haven’t really messed up the TV’s operation! You should now
NOT be able to receive any UHF TV station (any channel above 14). This
proves that the TV is in cable operation mode. If you try to tune to a channel
above 14, your TV may or may not go into Auto-Channel programming, if it
does, just wait until it finishes.
6) Connect up an antenna as in step 3 in the last section.
If you are using a Handheld portable TV or variable dial type tuner TV
set:
The Cube operates on cable channel 59 which, in frequency, is
located just below the standard UHF TV channel 14. Many radio style,
variable, manual tuner style TV sets will allow you to tune down this
far. We have had good results with both the color ($99.95) and black
and white ($49.95) automobile style TV sets as well as the Sony
Watchman. Select UHF on the TV tuner switch and tune the dial to
below channel 14 to receive the Cube’s signal, adjust tuning for best
reception.
USING YOUR CUBE OUTDOORS:
While your Cube 2000 has been encapsulated to protect the
precision adjustments and specialized circuits inside, the unit is not
waterproof and should be enclosed in a weatherproof housing for
outdoor use.

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TROUBLESHOOTING:
If you're having trouble getting your C2000 to work properly,
check to be sure that:
•your battery is connected correctly; red wire soldered to the
pad marked "RED" and black wire soldered to the pad
marked "BLK". Also be sure your solder connection is solid.
•you have a good 9 volt battery pack.
•your video source is operating properly. Try connecting your
camera directly to a TV or VCR and make sure you have a
good, clean picture. Once you've checked your camera,
solder its video output to the pad marked "YEL" NOTE: If
you are using a video source or camera other than a Ramsey
CCD camera, make sure your source has a 1 volt peak to
peak video signal.
•you have the ground or negative power connections on both
the camera power source and the Cube power source
connected to the Cube. Both grounds need to be connected
to the Cube for proper operation.
•you have the antenna properly connected to the CABLE IN
jack on your receiver.
•you have the TV set for CABLE channel 59. Your TV or VCR
should be set to CATV not AIR. If you're having trouble
setting up your TV or VCR, refer to your owners manual. The
C2000 will not work if your TV or VCR is not set to CABLE.
If none of the preceding has helped, refer to the Ramsey
Warranty section of this manual.

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