I won't repeat what the other reviewers have generally said but focus on some bullet points on its HF capabilities.
- Overall, very good HF reception, given its price. An inexpensive introduction to the SDR HF world and see if you want to invest more money and time in this aspect of the radio hobby.
- The RTL-SDR is running just slightly warm when using it on HF
- Based on using the RTL-SDR with the free program SDR#; was easy to download, install and run on my Windows 10 laptop PC. Go to the RTL-SDR web site for instructions and lots of related information.
- SDR# has many options to tweak the received signals. Takes a little time to experiment and zero in on the best settings.
- I'm in a typical medium sized city suburb with local AM and FM radio stations. An AMBCB filter was used to keep the local AMBCB out of much of the HF spectrum. A similar FM trap filter (which I do not have) would no doubt tame down the FM spurs that I see in the VHF signals. But the FM spurs do not show up in the HF band.
- A decent HF antenna is a must .. I'm using a 40 year old HyGain trap vertical with signal strengths in the same ballpark as my Yaesu FT450D using an OCF dipole antenna. The small whip antennas included with the RTL-SDR are pretty much not worthwhile with HF signals
- Tuning hams and other SSB signals is straightforward and gives good results.
- For shortwave broadcaster reception, a $50 radio will give improved results. For SSB reception, a $100 radio will be better. I'm referring to general sensitivity, selectivity, audio quality and ease of use.
- But the SDR-RTL does show the HF spectrum and its simple to scan around looking for various broadcast stations, hams, utilities, etc. In viewing the HF spectrum, many signals popup and then are gone. A conventional radio is more difficult to find these sporadic signals.
- Lots of room to experiment. I may eventually buy a Ham It Up upconverter or an SDRPlay RSP1 or RSP2, etc. which will give improved results.
- An excellent value .. recommended
5/14/17 Here is a screen shot (from the program SDR Console) of the RTL-SDR on the 40 meter Amateur Radio band on Sunday night. Lots of signals! Here I'm using the SDR as a 'panadapter' for my Yaesu FT450D ham transceiver. The program supports two way frequency synchronization with the FT450D .. meaning I can tune either the SDR or the FT450D and the other tracks the tuning. Neat!
| Nombre de marca | RTL-SDR Blog |
|---|---|
| Dimensiones del producto | 9,84 x 7,87 x 3,15 pulgadas |
| País de origen | China |
| Nombre del color | Negro - |
