Re: [IRCA] SDR

[Nick Hall-Patch <nhp@xxxxxxxx>]

At 13:30 5/15/2009, you wrote:
>At 10:34 PM 5/14/2009, you wrote:
>
>>Thinking about getting a SDR for AM DX.
>>Any advice is appreciated.
>>Web sites would help.
>> 
>>philbytheway
>
>
>Phil, I simply can't say enough good things about the Perseus SDR.  At this time, as far as I'm concerned, it's by far the best choice for MW DXing....Walt. (www.microtelecom.it/perseus)

There's at least a couple of Perseii in your area, Phil.  Check with Guy and/or Chuck, and check Guy's blog: http://perseus-sdr.blogspot.com/.

I presume that you want an SDR for its capability of recording many signals at once?  If so, Perseus is the winner, with a maximum of 1600kHz of recordable bandwidth.    If you just want to get a feel for what the fuss is about, an RFSpace SDR-IQ (http://www.rfspace.com/Home.html) will do that for less expense, but with only 190kHz of recordable bandwidth.

However, the SDR-IQ (and its big brother, the SDR-14) can show spurious signals in urban areas whereas the Perseus has a good reputation as a high quality receiver in its own right, even if you never used the full recording capabilities.  The Perseus also has a very active Yahoo group, with some pretty high level technical discussion.

Radio reception on the RFSpace units seems to have been an add-on to the SDR-14's use as an inexpensive recording spectrum analyzer, which have been featured in scientific work such as communications with a the Mars Phoenix lander (http://www.rfspace.com/BLOG/BLOG.html), and even a type of broadband sonar in this part of Canada.   Also, a number of SDR-14/IQ owners seem to use it for downconversion from VHF, similar to  the Mars lander work.    Although it's not open-source,  a lot of the code that is used to run the SDR-14 and IQ is freely available from the manufacturer, though there doesn't seem to be much evidence of people developing it further, at least on the respective Yahoo groups for the these SDRs.

The Perseus, in contrast, seems to have been developed primarily as a radio, and owners (the bulk of them MW DXers it appears) seem to be pretty ecstatic.   Although the manufacturer's code isn't available, there are at least two open-source programs that will drive the hardware, Winrad and Linrad.

Good luck in your hunt.

Nick








*****************************
Nick Hall-Patch
Victoria, BC
Canada 

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