Hi -
Before anyone tells me "Just google it" or "It's not our job to go out there and research this for you," I will say that I have done a lot of googling and looking into the features of these receivers and have found that it's actually a lot harder than that to find a good one. The problem is that how these receivers look on paper turns out to be a lot different than how users report they actually work. For example, a couple look perfect for what I want to do, but then when I look at forums and blogs about it, I find users reporting that they underpreform expectations due to things like high internal noise generation or poor reception on certain bands.
For example, the HackRF one looked perfect in a number of ways, until I read some user reports who said that the sensitivity and signal to noise ratio left a lot to be desired, compared to others. The Airspy HF plus looked great, but I've seen some users say that the HF reception is not so great. That said, it might be that those end users are not using the best antenna.
Right now, I'm leaning toward the SDRPlay, but now I see posts from some saying that it is less than 100% compatible with a lot of software. The Airspy HF+ also looked interesting, but I am about annoyed that it has a big gap between HF and VHF capabailities, which means I couldn't monitor stuff around the 50 mhz area, which includes the interesting 6 meter band. Also, the sampling bandwidth seems to leave some to be desired.
So that's why I'm not asking google. Too many conflicting results!
Right now, I have been using the RTL-SDR and it's an amazing receiver for the cost, but I love SDR so much that it's time to upgrade.
Here are the features I am looking for:
1. Must be the best possible receiver in general, with no gaps, no portions where internal components generate noise, good sensitivity etc etc.
2. Wide bandwidth (much wider than RTL) - Looking for someting on the order of 8 to 10 mhz or more.
3. Would like the bandwidth to be adjustable, so it won't choke the system if I'm running it on my laptop, which is a couple of years old
4. Full, seemless spectrum coverage, from at least a few khz up to at least 2.0 ghz or so. Of course, even more is better
5. Multiple antennas, at least for HF and VHF and higher. This is obviously important, since you don't want to try to receiver UHF with a long wire. Ideally, it switches automatically. The SDR play seems to do this.
6. Compatible with the software I already use. Primarily I use SDR# for most general purpose stuff, but I also use other Windows and Linux software. I've tried it out on Android, but I don't use that as often, because most of the professional software I use is for Windows, so that's just my main operating system.
7. Would be nice if i could hook it to a Raspberry Pi and then transmit the data over a network, so I could access it from multiple computers and alternate locations.
8. Being able to transmit is not really important to me. It would be an interesting thing to play around with, but I'm really looking to receive.
Right now, I am leaning toward the SDR Play. Most people seem to have good experiences with it, but I've also read that some major SDR software can't use all the features of it.
Again, I apologize if this comes off sounding like "Don't expect us to do your homrwork for you." It's not that. I've tried and found a lot of conflictory information. I'm hoping that people here have owned these or owned multiple units and can give some personal testimony as to how well they worked out.
Before anyone tells me "Just google it" or "It's not our job to go out there and research this for you," I will say that I have done a lot of googling and looking into the features of these receivers and have found that it's actually a lot harder than that to find a good one. The problem is that how these receivers look on paper turns out to be a lot different than how users report they actually work. For example, a couple look perfect for what I want to do, but then when I look at forums and blogs about it, I find users reporting that they underpreform expectations due to things like high internal noise generation or poor reception on certain bands.
For example, the HackRF one looked perfect in a number of ways, until I read some user reports who said that the sensitivity and signal to noise ratio left a lot to be desired, compared to others. The Airspy HF plus looked great, but I've seen some users say that the HF reception is not so great. That said, it might be that those end users are not using the best antenna.
Right now, I'm leaning toward the SDRPlay, but now I see posts from some saying that it is less than 100% compatible with a lot of software. The Airspy HF+ also looked interesting, but I am about annoyed that it has a big gap between HF and VHF capabailities, which means I couldn't monitor stuff around the 50 mhz area, which includes the interesting 6 meter band. Also, the sampling bandwidth seems to leave some to be desired.
So that's why I'm not asking google. Too many conflicting results!
Right now, I have been using the RTL-SDR and it's an amazing receiver for the cost, but I love SDR so much that it's time to upgrade.
Here are the features I am looking for:
1. Must be the best possible receiver in general, with no gaps, no portions where internal components generate noise, good sensitivity etc etc.
2. Wide bandwidth (much wider than RTL) - Looking for someting on the order of 8 to 10 mhz or more.
3. Would like the bandwidth to be adjustable, so it won't choke the system if I'm running it on my laptop, which is a couple of years old
4. Full, seemless spectrum coverage, from at least a few khz up to at least 2.0 ghz or so. Of course, even more is better
5. Multiple antennas, at least for HF and VHF and higher. This is obviously important, since you don't want to try to receiver UHF with a long wire. Ideally, it switches automatically. The SDR play seems to do this.
6. Compatible with the software I already use. Primarily I use SDR# for most general purpose stuff, but I also use other Windows and Linux software. I've tried it out on Android, but I don't use that as often, because most of the professional software I use is for Windows, so that's just my main operating system.
7. Would be nice if i could hook it to a Raspberry Pi and then transmit the data over a network, so I could access it from multiple computers and alternate locations.
8. Being able to transmit is not really important to me. It would be an interesting thing to play around with, but I'm really looking to receive.
Right now, I am leaning toward the SDR Play. Most people seem to have good experiences with it, but I've also read that some major SDR software can't use all the features of it.
Again, I apologize if this comes off sounding like "Don't expect us to do your homrwork for you." It's not that. I've tried and found a lot of conflictory information. I'm hoping that people here have owned these or owned multiple units and can give some personal testimony as to how well they worked out.
