Frequency Counter
- Thread starter TheSnake
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K4EET
Chaplain
The short answer is no. A spectrum analyzer would but they tend to be expensive. You might do some searching for an inexpensive SDR dongle that will give you a "waterfall" view of the spectrum that will help find the hotspots for active frequencies. I'm sure some other folks will chime in with more about that. Cheers! Dave
No, not really. It's only good for transmissions that are close to you. You could probably hook it up to an outside antenna and get some repeaters and other things like that. But for the most part, it has to be a close, pretty good signal for the frequency counters I've used to lock on to a signal / transmission. It would work good for something like getting the mall security frequency when you're at the mall close to the security guard transmitting. But it wouldn't likely lock onto your local police or county sheriff channel from home unless the repeater or unit talking was right there by you. And that's another thing. If it was getting a frequency that is on a repeater, and of course you want the repeater traffic to be able to listen to both sides, it wouldn't do a lot of good to just get the input frequency for a unit / radio close to you. It could be helpful in some simplex radio traffic situations if you're close enough though. But if you want to use it to find different police, fire, businesses, railroad, etc channels from home, I wouldn't expect much.
Brian
COMMSCAN
Brian
COMMSCAN
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Right answer above from letarotor. A $20 cheap RTL-SDR running free software will be better than a spectrum analyzer though will only show a limited bandwidth of frequencies. A more expensive AirSpy will show more (about 8 MHz). In additon, the waterfall display will be a better mode than the graph that a spectrum analyzer will only have.
K4EET
Chaplain
Out of curiosity, was there something wrong with my answer? Dave, K4EET
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No, I just wanted to give examples of what different SDRs might do (in regards to bandwidth viewed), cost (I meant to also say an AirSpy like I mentioned is around $200), and reinforce your good advice. And you did say "other folks will chime in", so I took you up on that.
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Yes, an SDR is definitely way to go. Way easier to get a visual picture via waterfall display of what is active around you. Alternatively the Uniden x36HPs & SDS series scanners have a discovery feature where you can enter a lower and upper limit to scan and it'll give you a summary of hits which in a way acts as a "frequency counter"
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One think I also do is use the free program "auto screen capture" to screen capture the program every 20 seconds. I can then walk away from the PC screen, come back later, go to the directory with the screen capture, and use a photo viewing program to see what happened while I was gone.
Auto Screen Capture for Windows - gHacks Tech News
Auto Screen Capture is a free open source program for Microsoft's Windows operating system to capture up to four connected screens automatically.
www.ghacks.net
I also use a program to stitch those into a short movie to make them easier to view (but the program I use to do that is no longer available but I am sure there are others).
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