What's out there that is like a 'reaction tuner'?

[w2dsx]

Looking for either a receiver or an SDR plug-in that can do a rapid near-field scan, similar to what the old Optoelectronics Scout could do. That had been on my "If I win Lotto" list but never got to play with one, and was put off also by having to mate it to outboard receiver. Is there something out there hand-held that can do this now? Is this something a TinySA (spectrum analyzer) can do? Or with an SDR?

One of the things I would hope to do is to chase down noisy or malfunctional 'smart readers'. As they're getting used more often in my area, it's starting to really impact the low end of 70cm and trying to track it old school is too slow.

Thanks in advance! 73, Jim w2dsx

 

[BinaryMode]

Off the top of my head, Uniden scanners with Close Call.

A more professional approach might be something with a Great Scott Gadgets HackRF. Add a Portapack for a display.

D-Fing something like that might be a PITA. A KrakenSDR might help. But the antennas need to be spaced exactly for the frequency being D-Fed.

Here in Colorado our great chieftains want to use nothing but renewable energy by 2040. As such smart meters are being installed in one town and city after another to be complaint. The noise is as bad as what comes out of the Denver/Boulder county elected chieftains of this state... I soon hope to be out of here like others.

 

[KC1UA]

The frequency scanner plug-in for SDR# may help. I use it for milair and it rips through the entire 225-380 MHz range in 25 kHz steps in about 3 seconds (roughly). You can also lock out any non-related signals and concentrate primarily on what you're looking for.

 

[w2dsx]

Thank you gents! I forgot about using the scanner plug-in for SDR#. I've been stuck with SDRPlay recently but their scanning leaves a lot to be desired, especially for milcom. Looking forward to playing with that again soon.

 

[KF5EGM]

Looking for either a receiver or an SDR plug-in that can do a rapid near-field scan, similar to what the old Optoelectronics Scout could do. That had been on my "If I win Lotto" list but never got to play with one, and was put off also by having to mate it to outboard receiver. Is there something out there hand-held that can do this now? Is this something a TinySA (spectrum analyzer) can do? Or with an SDR?

One of the things I would hope to do is to chase down noisy or malfunctional 'smart readers'. As they're getting used more often in my area, it's starting to really impact the low end of 70cm and trying to track it old school is too slow.

Thanks in advance! 73, Jim w2dsx

here's an idea, passive radar. Get a couple (maybe 4? ) sdrs, link (probably going to have to sodder them) the clocks together so they all use the same one, then use multiple antennas spaced several feet apart. This should be something like how passive radar works and if I'm thinking on the right thought path, should instantly find you the vector to your target. Then mount a camera outside, set it to put the time in metadata and probably on screen, record the rf (not the audio) for a day or so (will take a lot of disk space so go cheap on the storage, like usb ssd or usb hard drive) and then match the time and vector of the offending signal to the camera.