Thursday, September 30, 2021

Learning about SDR with Rick + Get ready for the Kraken!!!


Software Defined Radio is eating the world.  SDR devices have become common place in both the amateur radio and electronics hobbyist world for many years now and the good news is that hardware comes at different prices in order to appeal to different users.

On October 5th 2021 during the North Star Digital Net,  Rick W1RHS, will be talking about the inexpensive RTL-SDR USB dongles and where they fit in along side other much more expensive devices aimed at the amateur radio community.

For under $30 USD, this popular RTL-SDR V3 has been covered before on HVDN and Carl Laufer who is the manufacturer of this SDR has even shared some HVDN articles on his very popular RTL-SDR.com blog

And, because HVDN and Jim WA2UMP who runs this excellent DMR weekly discussion are close friends with Rick W1RHS, here is a quick link to Rick's upcoming presentation which will be live on talk group 31630 (STEM) on Brandmeister next Tuesday.  

Its also possible to listen to the discussion without a DMR radio by looking for 31630 in the talk group list at https://hose.brandmeister.network/#/ 

What about the software?  What about the Kraken?

Rick covers some really great detail on hardware plus some ideas for software, which is really needed to get your "software" defined radio to do anything.

Between Rick's latest presentation and one that Steve K2GOG did a while back on "Sensing the world around you", you will see many of the same references to certain software, like SDR#, SDR Play, SDRangel and a few others. Since the below chart was created, another cross platform application worth a strong look is called SDR++


One area which both presentations did not talk about is something called a phase coherent software defined radio which actually combines multiple radio's together in order to provide very unique capabilities.

The RTL-SDR.com website not only offers its inexpensive SDR many just call the "V3" but also a device called the Kerberos and its upcoming really exciting update to this called the Kraken

This topic on phase coherent SDR is best left for another time, like how to change some code to use the older Kerberos hardware with the newer software meant for the Kraken.

Please give a listen to support Rick and his October 5th SDR presentation by marking your calendar now incase you have other things in the Hudson Valley or beyond taking place the same evening.

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