Quote:
Originally Posted by NoPegs
As I understand it, practically the only thing it can't do on shortwave is make any more sense of a "numbers station" than the rest of us can.  |
That's about the truth. I mean, the unit is rather limited in performance due to the lack of serious filtering for the MW/HF bands. It's FM performance is outstanding; I picked up a 100kw FM station out of Raleigh, NC when I was in Lynchburg VA over christmas. 122 miles seems like a pretty good copy for an FM station using just twin-lead folded dipole on a 2nd floor deck. I still question that reception; I couldn't find any repeaters but that station was coming in abnormally clear for quite a few hours. I'm wondering if the elevation I was at in comparsion to the transmitter had something to do with it; a quick check on google earth didn't reveal any thing between me and Raleigh; and the antenna down there had a 1900' HAAT. Still, radio-locator map didn't show the signal anywhere near me. I've done 60 mile FM reception from stations with a 1m whip with great success.
The 8-bit ADC of the RTL chip also limits your noise floor; there by limiting your reception. There are probably some weak stations down in the "noise" a more proper radio with better dynamic range will pick up.
But, despite the 8-bit limitation; having a device that'll go from 100khz to 1.7ghz and "decode" anything you've got software for is amazing. Wanna pick up ADS-B transponders? no problem. Need to decode some weefax? Go for it!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Electronic M
I happen to passionately hate Matlab, and unless I clone my hard drive before I (hopefully)graduate next quarter I won't have that software anymore (we get to keep the laptop, but not the software or EVEN the OS).
Is there other windows compatible software out there to work these units?
If there is what do you use?
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There's loads of windows software for these things. dtvmcdonald mentioned SDR#, my current program of choice. No idea why the screenshots didn't show up; they did when I posted. They all have a learning curve; but no where near as steep as MatLab or GNURadio...you don't need to know any programming...just pick your mode and frequency. But MatLab has been popular with this hardware because a $10 piece of hardware now allows you to feed real-world RF in to MatLab for designing receivers.
But there's also software like HDSDR, SDR-Radio, and a few other special-purpose programs that will interface with this. I can't really program to save my life; but I do just fine with SDR#...which is adding features that are rapidly making it one of the better choices for SDR use. The only time I boot something besides SDR# is when I want to listen to an SCA on FM.
I pulled a couple of pirates out of the air on HF the other night; and during the snow on Saturday pulled a 500watt am station from over 100 miles away.
But, like NoPegs said, about the only thing they can't do is help you understand numbers stations or encrypted comms...but you can at least look at them.