Description
Program and build Raspberry Pi based ham station utilities, tools, and instruments
The new improved RTL-SDR V4 allows you to receive radio signals between 500 kHz and 1.75 GHz from stations utilizing different bands including MW/SW/LW broadcast, ham radio, utility, air traffic control, PMR, SRD, ISM, CB, weather satellite, and radio astronomy.
The new book Raspberry Pi 5 for Radio Amateurs gives extensive coverage of deploying the RTL-SDR kit through the use of a Raspberry Pi 5.
This bundle contains:
RTL-SDR V4 (Software Defined Radio) with Dipole Antenna Kit
RTL-SDR is an affordable dongle that can be used as a computer-based radio scanner for receiving live radio signals between 500 kHz and 1.75 GHz in your area.
The new RTL-SDR V4 offers several improvements over generic brands including use of the R828D tuner chip, triplexed input filter, notch filter, improved component tolerances, a 1 PPM temperature compensated oscillator (TCXO), SMA F connector, aluminium case with passive cooling, bias tee circuit, improved power supply, and a built in HF upconverter.
RTL-SDR V4 comes with the portable dipole antenna kit. It is great for beginners as it allows for terrestrial and satellite reception and easy to mount outdoors and designed for portable and temporary outside usage.
Features
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Improved HF reception: V4 now uses a built-in upconverter instead of using a direct sampling circuit. This means no more Nyquist folding of signals around 14.4 MHz, improved sensitivity, and adjustable gain on HF. Like the V3, the lower tuning range remains at 500 kHz and very strong reception may still require front end attenuation/filtering.
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Improved filtering: The V4 makes use of the R828D tuner chip, which has three inputs. The SMA input has been triplexed input into 3 bands: HF, VHF and UHF. This provides some isolation between the 3 bands, meaning out of band interference from strong broadcast stations is less likely to cause desensitization or imaging.
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Improved filtering x2: In addition to the triplexing, the open drain pin on the R828D can be also used, which allows to add simple notch filters for common interference bands such as broadcast AM, broadcast FM and the DAB bands. These only attenuate by a few dB, but may still help.
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Improved phase noise on strong signals: Due to an improved power supply design, phase noise from power supply noise has been significantly reduced.
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Less heat: Another advantage of the improved power supply is low power consumption and less heat generation compared to the V3.
Included
- 1x RTL-SDR V4 dongle (R828D RTL2832U 1PPM TCXO SMA)
- 2x 23 cm to 1 m telescopic antenna
- 2x 5 cm to 13 cm telescopic antenna
- 1x Dipole antenna base with 60 cm RG174
- 1x 3 m RG174 extension cable
- 1x Flexible tripod mount
- 1x Suction cup mount
Links
Book: Raspberry Pi 5 for Radio Amateurs
The RTL-SDR devices (V3 and V4) have gained popularity among radio amateurs because of their very low cost and rich features. A basic system may consist of a USB based RTL-SDR device (dongle) with a suitable antenna, a Raspberry Pi 5 computer, a USB based external audio input-output adapter, and software installed on the Raspberry Pi 5 computer. With such a modest setup, it is possible to receive signals from around 24 MHz to over 1.7 GHz.
This book is aimed at amateur radio enthusiasts and electronic engineering students, as well as at anyone interested in learning to use the Raspberry Pi 5 to build electronic projects. The book is suitable for both beginners through experienced readers. Some knowledge of the Python programming language is required to understand and eventually modify the projects given in the book. A block diagram, a circuit diagram, and a complete Python program listing is given for each project, alongside a comprehensive description.
The following popular RTL-SDR programs are discussed in detail, aided by step-by-step installation guides for practical use on a Raspberry Pi 5:
- SimpleFM
- GQRX
- SDR++
- CubicSDR
- RTL-SDR Server
- Dump1090
- FLDIGI
- Quick
- RTL_433
- aldo
- xcwcp
- GPredict
- TWCLOCK
- CQRLOG
- klog
- Morse2Ascii
- PyQSO
- Welle.io
- Ham Clock
- CHIRP
- xastir
- qsstv
- flrig
- XyGrib
- FreeDV
- Qtel (EchoLink)
- XDX (DX-Cluster)
- WSJT-X
The application of the Python programming language on the latest Raspberry Pi 5 platform precludes the use of the programs in the book from working on older versions of Raspberry Pi computers.
