SDR# has just been updated to version 1525 (changelog) and it now includes a new program called ‘SpyServer’. SpyServer is a Windows based streaming server for Airspy devices, and is somewhat similar to what rtl_tcp is for RTL-SDR devices. To run the server, all that you need to do is plug in the Airspy on the server PC and open the server software. Then on the remote PC select the ‘SpyServer’ radio source in SDR# and enter the server IP and default port.

We tested SpyServer with our Airspy R2 and found that it worked perfectly, however due to the very high data rates the maximum bandwidth cannot be used over a slow network. On a standard WiFi connection we were able to use a bandwidth of up to 250 kHz, and on a remote test server over the internet only 37.5 kHz. The author of SDR#, Youssef Touil however has mentioned that a gigabit network can support the maximum 10 MSPS bandwidth option with no problems. We assume that SpyServer will eventually be updated to include low bandwidth options which only stream compressed demodulated audio and waterfall data.

The SpyServer is also implemented with a special multi client DDC architecture. This allows for many clients to connect to a single server, and they can each have a different frequency and bandwidth (within the current active bandwidth around the center frequency).

We think that the SpyServer should also work well with the upcoming Airspy HF+, an HF optimized SDR.

The post SpyServer: Airspy Streaming Server Now Released appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

On the Google Play store a new RTL-SDR compatible app called ‘Aerial TV’ has been released (in beta) by Martin Marinov. Aerial TV allows you to watch DVB-T HD TV on your android device, with an RTL-SDR connected to it via USB OTG cable. Martin is also the author of the popular SDR Touch Android program and the RTL2832U Android driver port. 

The new software requires a different DVB-T driver app to be installed first, which is also provided by Martin. This is because the RTL-SDR needs to be operated in a mode different to the way that the SDR drivers use it in. Martin has also open sourced his Android DVB-T driver and it is available on GitHub.

Aerial TV is currently free on the Google Play store, but looks like it may eventually have some in-app purchases. Also, it is currently marked as ‘Unreleased’ on Google Play, which is essentially a beta version, so you might expect there to be some bugs.

Over on YouTube user GiamMa-based researchers SDR R&D IoT has uploaded a video showing Aerial TV scanning for TV channels, and then eventually playing some video.

The post Aerial TV: An Android DVB-T Decoder for the RTL-SDR appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

The Tekmanoid EGC STD-C decoder was recently updated and a new commercial paid version was released. The paid version now supports the decoding of LES STD-C messages. Previously the only other decoder that we knew of which was able to decode LES messages was the www.inmarsatdecoder.com software. The new Tekmanoid version costs €55 whereas the inmarsatdecoder.com software costs €100.

The free versions of both decoders only decode the EGC broadcast messages which contain SafetyNET messages. These include messages like weather reports, shipping lane activity and hazards such as submarine cables and oil rig movements, pirate activity, refugee ship reports, missing ship reports, and military exercise warnings. 

The paid version can decode the other non-broadcast private LES STD-C channels. LES STD-C channels typically contain email like messages sent to and from ships. Mostly it’s company messages about the ship route plans, cargo discussions, repair/fault discussions, ship performance information and weather reports etc. Each Inmarsat satellite contains about 7 LES channels each run by a different telecommunications company, so one may be of interest to you.

The paid version of the Tekmanoid decoder also has a nice feature for visualizing the SafetyNET EGC messages. Every now and then an alert containing coordinates and an area is sent out. Usually it is something like a distress alert from an EPIRB or the search area for a missing vessel. The decoder generates an HTML file that displays these areas on a map, alongside the text message.

The author of the Tekamnoid software allowed us to test his new paid version for free. We ran the software using signal from an Outernet patch antenna and LNA. An RTL-SDR V3. SDR# was used as the receiver, and the audio was piped to the Tekmanoid decoder with VB-Cable. Decoding was almost flawless on both LES and EGC STD-C channels. In a previous recent update the Tekmanoid decoder was updated for improved decoding performance, and now in our opinion it is almost or just as good as the inmarsatdecoder.com software.  

If you are interested in learning more about decoding Inmarsat STD-C we have a tutorial available here. LES channels for the Inmarsatellite in operation over your geographic location can be found on UHF-Satcom’s website.

Remember that LES STD-C messages are not publicly broadcast, so in some countries it may not be legal to receive them. Most countries will have a law that says you can receive and decode the data, but you may not act upon or use to your advantage any information from the messages.

The post Tekmanoid STD-C Decoder Updated: New Paid LES Decoder + EGC Visualization appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

Programmer Vi Vitaliy recently wrote into us and wanted to share his new ‘UnoSDR’ software defined radio receiver software for Windows. This is a general purpose multi-mode receiver which is compatible with the RTL-SDR. The blurb reads:

UnoSDR is a simple, modern, intuitive interface, small and fast PC-based DSP application for Software Defined Radio (SDR). It’s written in C++ and Qt Quick cross-platform framework. Typical applications are Shortwave listening, Ham Radio, Radio Astronomy and Spectrum analysis.

UnoSDR supports both the RTL-SDR and soundcard based SDRs. With the RTL-SDR UnoSDR must be run via an rtl_tcp server. The software is for the Windows platform, but it seems that there is also an Android version, although this may not yet support the RTL-SDR as we could not get it to connect to our rtl_tcp server.

We tested the Windows version and it ran well despite a few glitches with trying to get the software to connect. There is also a bit of a delay when tuning due to the use of rtl_tcp, and the delays that using a network stream entail even when connected to the localhost. Also we only saw support for AM, USB, LSB and WFM modes. The other modes may be added later as the software still appears to be in development.

The post UnoSDR: A New Multi-Mode RTL-SDR Compatible Receiver Program appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

Thanks to Albrecht Lohofener for submitting to us his new software package called ‘welle.io’ which is a free DAB and DAB+ decoder and player that supports the RTL-SDR (directly or also via rtl_tcp) and Airspy software defined radios. The software can be run on both Windows and Linux, and also supports Raspberry Pi 2/3 and cheap Chinese Windows 10 tablets.

Albrecht writes that his software is a fork of the qt-dab codebase, with the development goal being to create an easy to use DAB/DAB+ software receiver. The software is still under heavy development, and Albrecht mentions that he is looking for fellow developers and testers to help improve the software and report any bugs. Albrecht writes:

I’m proud to introduce a new open source DAB/DAB+ reception application welle.io https://www.welle.io. welle.io is a fork of qt-dab http://github.com/JvanKatwijk/qt-dab (old dab-rpi and sdr-j-dab) with the goal to develop an easy to use DAB/DAB+ reception application. It supports high DPI and touch displays and it runs even on cheap computers like Raspberry Pi 2/3 and 100€ China Windows 10 tablets. As input devices welle.io supports rtlsdr and airspy.

Currently daily Windows binary builds are available over on the projects GitHub. For Linux and Raspberry Pi users you’ll need to compile the code from source, but in the future he plans to provide Ubuntu snaps.

We gave the welle.io software a brief test and it ran as expected. There is an automatic channel scan feature which scans through all the possible DAB channels and an advanced mode for seeing technical information such as the frequency, SNR and error rates. The software also has a nice touchscreen friendly GUI which automatically downloads and displays the DAB/DAB+ program guide information.

The post welle.io: A New RTL-SDR & Airspy DAB/DAB+ Decoder Available for Windows/Linux appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

Over on YouTube a video titled “Hunting Rogue WiFi Devices using the HackRF SDR” has been uploaded. The talk is given by Mike Davis at the OWASP (Open Web Application Security Project) Cape Town. The talk’s abstract reads:

Rogue WiFi Access Points are a serious security risk for today’s connected society. Devices such as the Hak5 Pineapple, ESP8266-based ‘throwies’, or someone with the right WiFi card and software can be used to intercept users’ traffic and grab all of their credentials. Finding these rogue devices is a very difficult thing to achieve without specialised equipment. In this talk Mike will discuss the work he has been doing over the past year, to use the HackRF SDR as a RF Direction-finding device, with the goal of hunting down various malicious RF devices, including car remote jammers.

The talk starts off with the basics, explaining what the problems with WiFi devices are, what the HackRF and SDR is, and then goes on to explain some direction finding methods that Mike has been using. 

The post YouTube Talk: Hunting Rogue WiFi Devices using the HackRF SDR appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

Over on the Thought Emporium YouTube channel the team have uploaded two videos that may be of interest to radio hobbyists. The first video shows a nice overview about receiving NOAA weather satellite images. They explain everything from scratch for complete novice, so the videos are great for almost anyone to watch and learn about radio and SDR concepts. The blurb of the first video reads:

Over the past 2 months, me and my friend Artem have been building antennas to receive signals from weather satellites as they pass overhead. This video chronicles our progress through this project and goes through some of the science involved in working with radio and receiving transmissions. We explore how dipoles work and how to build them, and how we built our final double cross antenna. We used an SDR (software defined radio) called a HackRF to do the work of interpreting the received signals and then decoded them with some special software. We pulled images from 4 satellites: NOAA 15, 18 and 19 as well as METEOR M2. The satellites broadcast immediately as they take the images and no images are stored, so we’re likely the only ones on earth with these images.

The second video is about building a radio telescope. Like the NOAA video, they explain all concepts in a simple and easy to understand way, so that anyone even without any radio knowledge can understand what the project is about. In the video they also show how they use a 3D printer to create a tracking mount which can point a satellite dish. They then use the dish to create a satellite heat map. The blurb reads:

Over the last 2 months me and my friend Artem (you met him in the last video) built our first radio telescope. It was built mostly out of off the shelf components, like a satellite dish and Ku band LNB, as well as some parts we 3d printed. When all was said and done we had a system that could not only take images of the sky in radio frequencies (in this case 10-12ghz), but could also be used to track satellites. With it, we were able to see the ring of satellites in geosynchronous orbit, over 35,000km away, This is only the first of what I suspect will be many more telescopes like this. Next time we’ll be building ones that are far larger and can see things like the hydrogen lines so we can image the milky way.

The post YouTube Videos: NOAA Satellite Tutorial and Building a Radio Telescope appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

On his blog leander has added a post which shows how he has set up a icecast streaming solution together with an RTL-SDR dongle which is receiving live NOAA weather radio. The idea is to give a computer with no soundcard the ability to stream compressed NOAA weather audio over a network. To do this he uses ezstream, icecast2 and lame. Streaming like this is great if you only want to listen to a single radio channel, and want a low bandwidth solution. Something like rtl_tcp streams the entire raw IQ data across the network which can use huge amounts of bandwidth. Streaming only MP3 audio is significantly more efficient.

First the RTL-SDR is set up to receive NOAA weather audio with rtl_fm. The audio is output to stdin, which is then sent to lame for encoding and MP3 compression. Next ezstream is set up to stream the encoded MP3 data via icecast. Now any PC on the network can use VLC or a similar program to connect to the stream and listen in.

The post Creating a RTL-SDR NOAA Weather Radio Audio Streamer in Linux appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

We’re happy to announce that in conjunction with Mike, one of the leaders in the SDRplay users community, we have manufactured and released a high quality aluminum enclosure upgrade for the SDRplay RSP-1 software defined radio. The SDRplay RSP-1 is a $129 USD 12 bit SDR that can tune between 10 kHz – 2 GHz. It comes by default in a simple plastic enclosure. Upgrading to a metal case enclosure not only looks sleeker, but also shields the RSP-1 from strong RF interference directly entering the PCB.

The enclosure also comes with a bonus RTL-SDR Blog broadcast FM (BCFM) filter to help reduce overloading and images from extremely strong broadcast FM stations. This filter can be installed either inside or outside the metal enclosure.

Also included is a semi-hardshell travel case which is perfect for protecting the RSP-1 while on the move. Finally, some accessories such as a thermal pad for mounting, grounding lug with nuts, 3M rubber feet and of course the enclosure screws are also included.

The cost of the enclosure including all extras is $39.95 USD with worldwide shipping included. The case is available from our Chinese warehouse for customers anywhere in the world, and in a few days it will also be able on Amazon USA for faster local US shipments. Shipping on Amazon should also be free as the free shipping threshold on Amazon was recently reduced back down to $35 USD.

Visit our store to purchase

See some images below for an overview of what you get in the package:

The post New Product in Our Store: SDRplay RSP-1 Aluminum Case Upgrade appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

Early last month we released a new broadcast AM high pass filter product. The goal of the filter is to block out extremely strong broadcast AM signals (and other problematic LF/MF signals) in order to prevent an SDR from overloading. This is especially needed if you live close to AM towers.

Over on the Utility DX Forum files section, reviewer D. B. Gain has written an excellent review of our broadcast AM high pass filter (pdf), also explaining why and in what situations it might be needed. In the review he explains how broadcast AM propagation works, and how it can change from day to night. He also explains how devices with diode switches (used for switching RF circuits such as filter in and out electronically) can easily overload and contribute to IMD within the switches themselves. This is why a filter without any diode switches in front of it is usually the best solution for reducing strong RF energies.

In the review he then goes on to test the filter, showing some screenshots of the reduction is AM signal strength.

The post Discussion and Review of our RTL-SDR Blog Broadcast AM High Pass Filter appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

The PortaPack is an addon created by Jared Boone for the HackRF software defined radio. It costs $200 USD at the sharebrained store and together with a USB battery pack it allows you to go completely portable with your HackRF. The HackRF is a multi-purpose SDR which can both receive and transmit anything (as long as you program it in) from 1 MHz to 6 GHz. 

Since we last posted about the PortaPack many new features have been added, and the firmware has matured significantly. Now the official PortaPack firmware allows you to receive and demodulate SSB, AM, NFM, WFM and display up to an 18 MHz wide waterfall. You can also decode marine AIS, the automobile tyre pressure monitoring system (TPMS) and utility ITRON ERT meters.

There is also a popular fork of the official PortaPack firmware called portapack-havoc, which is created by a dev who goes by the handle ‘furrtek’. This firmware is a bit more risky in terms of the trouble it can get you into as it enables several new features including:

• Close call – See if anyone is transmitting near to you
• A CW generator
• a GPS and various other jammers
• an LCR transmitter – the wireless protocol used in France for programming traffic related signage
• a microphone transmitter
• a pocsag receiver and transmitter – receive and send to pagers
• a PWM RSSI output – useful for crude automatic direction finding
• an RDS transmitter – transmit radio station text data to compatible broadcast FM radios
• a soundboard – play a stored bank of wav sounds on a frequency
• an SSTV tranmitter – transmit slow scan TV signals
• an OOK transmitter – control on-off-keying devices such as doorbells.

Below we’ve created a YouTube playlist showing several videos that show the portapack in action.

And below we show a tweet from @furrtek showing off the recently added SSTV transmit feature, and a tweet from @giorgiofox showing off the microphone transmit feature.

The post Some HackRF Portapack Demos appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

Over on the SWLing post blog Tony Roper has uploaded his review and testing of the LNA4ALL. The LNA4ALL is a PSA-5043+ LNA produced by Adam 9A4QV in Croatia. It is normally considered as one of the best wideband LNAs for RTL-SDR users as it designed well, built well, runs well and is reasonably priced at 20 Euros.

On his post Tony tests the LNA4ALL and compares his measured gain specs against the claimed gain specs on the LNA4ALL website. At 5V power supply he found that the real vs claimed gains matched quite nicely.

Although the LNA4ALL is only specified to run down to 3.3V, Tony found that he could still get usable performance out of it with only a 1.2V supply. However, the gain was reduced by a few dB’s, and we also assume that the IP3 characteristics would also be sufficiently degraded at the low voltage.

Testing the LNA4ALL with his NASA Engine AIS receiver, he found that the LNA4ALL boosted his reception range from 15nm without the LNA, to 22nm with the LNA, and also tripled his received messages.

The post Some Tests on the LNA4ALL appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

Over on the Outernet forums Outernet CEO Syed has just released pictures of the latest upcoming Outernet receiver called “Dreamcatcher”. The new receiver is an RTL-SDR, LNA, filter, and embedded Linux capable computing hardware all on board a single PCB. The full specs are pasted below:

• L-band SAW filter (1525 – 1559 MHz)
• Two-stage L-band LNA with 34dB gain
• 0.5 PPM TCXO
• RF bypass for tuning from 24 – 1600 MHz – use as a regular RTL-SDR!
• USB ports
• GPIO forest
• UARTs, I2C, SPI headers (unpopulated) for driving external hardware
• Two microSD card holders – for boot and storage!
• 1 GHz CPU
• 256 MB RAM Now 512 MB RAM
• USB wifi dongle (not shown) – STA+ AP mode capable!
• Lots of LEDs! and Switches!
• microUSB OTG
• microUSB power port
• Audio In/Out
• Speaker with 1.4 W integrated audio amplifier
• Fully mainline (4.10) Kernel and (2017.01) Uboot support!
  *** JST battery is being removed

On the Roadmap:

• armbian/debian support

This is a fully-integrated SDR receiver – RF frontend, SDR, Compute, Wifi – Everything!

Outernet is an L-band satellite service that aims to be a download only “library in the sky”. Currently they are broadcasting from Inmarsat and Alphasat geostationary satellites which can be received from almost anywhere in the world. We have a tutorial on receiving and decoding their signal here. Every day almost 20 MB of data is sent down, and this includes data like news, weather forecasts, APRS, wikipedia articles, books and more. In the future you will be able to pay to upload private files or messages. This could be useful for sending messages to people isolated from cell phone reception, or for operating remote hardware.

Previously Outernet sold a DIY version of their receiver which included an RTL-SDR V3 or E4000 dongle, LNA+filter, a C.H.I.P embedded computer, and a patch antenna. Recently they have changed to their custom RTL-SDR hardware which is called the “SDRx”. The SDRx includes the RTL-SDR, LNA and filter on a single PCB. Over time it seems that they are moving in the direction of integration of all components onto a single PCB and this can be seen in the Dreamcatcher which now also includes the computing hardware. This is especially good news as the $9 C.H.I.P computing hardware has been almost impossible to acquire since its release.

The Dreamcatcher looks to be also not just useful for Outernet, but also for general projects that can be done on embedded hardware as there is a port which bypasses the L-Band filter.

Back in 2014 we posted about the XiOne. This was also to be an RTL-SDR and computing hardware built onto the same PCB. It would have been controlled via a WiFi connection and apps on a smart phone/tablet. Unfortunately the XiOne Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign never reached its target so the project faded away. The Dreamcatcher is somewhat similar in that both are RTL-SDRs with onboard computing hardware and WiFi connectivity.

The Dreamcatcher is not yet for sale, but it is currently under production. From the looks of the discussion on the forums, it looks like it will sell for $149 USD. Outernet have said that they are sending us a review sample, so keep an eye out for the review in the coming weeks.

The post New Outernet Hardware “Dreamcatcher”: An RTL-SDR with Embedded Computing Hardware appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

The ColibriNANO is a new software defined radio that is currently available for pre-order and is expected to be ready for delivery by the end of April 2017. The specs show that it is a direct sampling receiver (no tuner), which can receive from 10 kHz to 500 MHz in oversampling mode, and from 10 kHz to 55 MHz in standard mode. It uses a 14 Bit ADC which provides up to 110 dB’s of blocking dynamic range, and can run with a sampling rate of up to 3 MHz. The press release given to us reads:

New ColibriNANO SDR USB Receiver with a 14-bit ADC .01-500MHz

Kirkland, WA, USA —March 27 th , 2017 –

Vasily Vasiliev, Chief Hardware Engineer of Expert Electronics is pleased to announce availability of new ColibriNANO 0.01-500 MHz receiver in late April, 2017.

Notable features include the blocking dynamic range (BDR) ~110dB, native .01-55 MHz coverage with up to 500 MHz in oversampling mode, low pass filter (LPF) <60 MHz, full compatibility with HDSDR, legacy SDR#, and ExpertSDR2 software.

Supported platforms are Windows® XP-10, Linux and Web-client for HTML5 browsers.

No existing USB SDR receivers combine high sensitivity and broad dynamic range. Remote operation (TCP/IP) interface is built-in and offers plug-and- play solutions for Amateur, Commercial and Government applications.

For further information call (800)977-0448 or email sales@nsiradio.com

https://www.nsiradio.com

Currently we see that the ColibriNANO is selling for $249.95 USD on the nsiradio.com website. We’ve also seen the following description on the sunsdr.eu website:

With the new ColibriNANO you will be able to enjoy LF, MW and Shortwave listening in many different ways. For example you can record the entire medium wave band using 1.5 MHz sampling rate, decode CW using CW skimmer, remote control the ColibriNANO by plugging it into our RPI server. There are an endless range of applications for this small SDR. All this in a tiny USB stick!

The ColibriNANO features a Texas Instruments ADS4145 14 bit direct sampling ADC and a built in low 55 MHz pass filter that can be bypassed to receive signals up to 500 MHz (external filters  like the our 2m filtered preamp recommended).

CW skimmer and Skimmer With the external ExtIO library the ColibriNANO can be used with third party software like HDSDR etc.

This is not a cheap USB dongle found on Ebay, this high quality SDR receiver is developed by Expert Electronics and features a sturdy aluminium chassis, ESD protection, USB 2.0 interface and a quality SMA antenna connector.

Best of all, the ColibriNANO travels in your pocket and only needs your computer and an antenna! Its the ultimate portable SDR receiver!

Software support

• ExpertSDR2
• CW Skimmer
• Skimmer Server
• Third party software using ExtIO library

Specifications

• Receiving bandwidth: 0.1 – 55 MHz
• Oversampling receiving: 0.1 – 500 MHz
• Blocking Dynamic Range (BDR): 110 dB
• Sensitivity: 0.05 uV at 20M band, preamp = 0
• IMD3 Dynamic Range: 95 dB
• ADC resolution: 14-bit @ 122.88 MHz
• Sample rate: 48, 96, 192, 384, 768 kHz and 1.5, 3.0 MHz
• IQ resolution: 24 bit (16 bit at 1.5 and 3 MHz sample rates)
• RF Input: (SMA connector, up to 15kV ESD protection)
• Preamp range: from 31.5 up to +6 dB with 0.5 dB steps
• Operating temperature: -10°C to 60°C
• Dimensions: 90х25х17mm
• Weight: 0.043kg

It looks like that this receiver may compete somewhat with the also upcoming Airspy HF+. The Airspy HF+ claims similar specs including a frequency range of 0 – 270 MHz, 14 Bit ADC and 108 dB blocking dynamic range. But the target price for the HF+ is below $200 USD.

The post ColibriNANO: A New 10 kHz to 500 MHz Direct Sampling Receiver appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

Last week we made a post about the HackRF Portapack, and gave some examples of it in action. Recently the furtek Havoc firmware for the portapack was updated, and it now supports SSTV transmission. Over on Twitter, Giorgio Campiotti‏ @giorgiofox has uploaded a video showing an example transmission in action.

In the video the HackRF with Portapack transmits a test SSTV image to an Elecraft K3 ham radio, which is linked to a PC. SSTV decoding software on the PC turns the data back into an image.

SSTV stands for ‘Slow Scan TV’, and is a method used by hams to send images over radio. Typically this activity occurs on HF frequencies. Sometimes the ISS transmits SSTV images down to earth as well to commemorate special events.

The post Testing SSTV Transmission with the HackRF and Portapack appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

RPiTX is a piece of software that you can run on your Raspberry Pi unit, which with no additional hardware turns it into a full radio transmitter, capable of transmitting FM, AM, SSB and other signals anywhere from 5 kHz to 500 MHz. Of course remember that the methods used to do this emit a lot of harmonics, so to be legal and safe filtering should be used on the signal output.

Over on Twitter Cyril‏ @kotzebuedog has been experimenting with RPiTX and his radio controlled toy car. From the videos and images, it appears that he’s used GNU Radio to create the required control signals which then transmits the data to the RC car via RPiTX. With this he’s been able to create a program to control his RC car with his computer gaming joystick.

The post Controlling an RC Car with RPiTX appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

Over on YouTube user Danny Shortwave And Radio DX has uploaded a video showing an overview and tutorial about setting up the Soft66IP RTL-SDR. The Soft66IP is a custom RTL-SDR that is made in Japan by JA7TDO. It is an RTL-SDR with upconverter and LNA built into a box together with an embedded computing platform. We’re not sure what the computing platform is, but it is likely to be something similar to a Raspberry Pi. The computing platform is then used to run an rtl_tcp server, and so via a network cable or WiFi connection the device can be accessed by a remote PC.

On the video Danny gives an overview on what the Soft66IP is, and what features it has. Then later in the tutorial he shows how to SSH into the Linux server on the Soft66IP, set it up for your local network, and then later how to connect to it from a remote PC.

The post YouTube Tutorial on Setting up a Soft66IP RTL-SDR appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

Over on YouTube user ElPaso TubeAmps has uploaded a video showing his tests on our broadcast AM (BCAM) high pass and broadcast FM (BCFM) band stop filters. These two filters are designed to block broadcast radio signals which in some locations can be extremely strong. If they are very strong then they can overload your SDR which causes very poor performance, even on other frequencies.

Some possible solutions for reducing overloading include:

1. Attenuation – reduce all the strength of ALL signals coming in.
2. Increase SDR dynamic range – purchase a higher end SDR with more ADC bits as these can handle strong and weak signals coming in together much better.
3. Filtering – reduce the signal strength on the problematic frequencies that are causing overload, or only allow your frequency of interest to pass.
4. Antenna tuning – use a narrowband, directional and/or differently polarized antenna which reduces the unwanted signal’s strength.

In the video he uses his signal generator and a spectrum analyzer to analyze the output of the filters. His results closely match our VNA results which are posted on the BCFM and BCAM filter product release posts.

The post Some Tests on our BCAM and BCFM Filters appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

Back in September 2015 we made a posted that discussed how some amateur radio astronomers have been using RTL-SDR’s for detecting pulsars. A pulsar is a rotating neutron star that emits a beam of electromagnetic radiation. If this beam points towards the earth, it can then be observed with a large dish antenna and a radio, like the RTL-SDR.

In their work they showed how they were able to detect and measure the rotational period of the Vela pulsar, one of the strongest and easiest to receive pulsars. They also noted how using several RTL-SDR dongles could reduce the required satellite dish size.

Recently we came across Hannes Fasching (OE5JFL)’s work where he shows that he has detected 15 pulsars so far using RTL-SDR dongles. His detection system specs include:

Antenna: 7.3m homemade offset dish, OE5JFL tracking system
Feeds: 70cm (424 MHz) dual-dipole with solid reflector, 23cm (1294 MHz) RA3AQ horn
Preamplifiers: 23cm cavity MGF4919, 70cm 2SK571 (30 years old!)
Line Amplifier: PGA103+
Interdigital filter: designed with VK3UM software, 70cm 4-pole, 23cm 3-pole
Receiver: RTL-SDR (error <1ppm), 2 MHz bandwidth
Software: IW5BHY, Presto, Tempo, Murmur

Furthermore, from looking at the Neutron Star Group website, it seems that the majority of amateur radio astronomers interested in pulsar detection are currently using RTL-SDR dongles as the receiver. Some of them have access to very large 25m dishes, but some like IW5BHY, IK5VLS and I0NAA use smaller 2.5m – 5m dishes which can fit into a backyard.

If you are interested in getting into amateur pulsar detection, check out the Neutron Star Group website as they have several resources available for learning.

The post Amateur Pulsar Observations with an RTL-SDR appeared first on rtl-sdr.com.

Thanks to twitter user @LinuxSocist for submitting a link to this new Meteor M weather satellite LRPT decoder called ‘meteor_decoder’ which can be run on both Linux and Windows. Pre-built binary of the software for Windows, Linux Raspberry Pi and MacOS are available at ordbides.org.

This software decoder appears to be an excellent choice for those people who want to perform their reception and decoding of Meteor M satellites all in Linux. Previously as explained in this previous post, you were able to receive the QPSK data in Linux with an RTL-SDR and a GNU Radio program, but then you’d still need to boot into Windows or run Wine to run LRPTofflinedecoder in order to generate the image. Now it appears that the image generation can be performed natively in Linux too with meteor_decoder. This help with creating portable automated Raspberry Pi based Meteor M decoder servers.

Meteor M is a class of Russian weather satellites that transmit live weather images of the earth as they pass over your location. They are somewhat similar to the NOAA satellites, although the Meteor satellites transmit higher quality images via a digital LRPT signal, rather than the analog APT signals used by NOAA. With an RTL-SDR, an appropriate antenna and decoding software they can easily be received.

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