SDR - Hardware First Steps

If you haven't read the SDR Page on this blog, do so first as it gives the basics about SDR.

Hardware

Having decided, mainly because of the low costs involved, to give SDR a try, I need to get my hands on some hardware!

I have plenty of PC's of various configurations and OS's available.  What I need to purchase is a USB DVB-T Dongle and an aerial for initial testing.

Having read the Wiki at: http://rtlsdr.org/start.  I had an idea of the different chips and the frequency ranges they covered.  Remember my goal here is to get a basic setup for as little cash as possible, with the most possible features.

I decided on the Rafael Micro R820T chip and tried a simple search on eBay for R820T.


There are a plenty of results for this search, lots of devices internationally, unsurprisingly a large number from China, and a smaller number based in the UK.  As I wanted a guaranteed fast delivery, I opted for a UK Supplier.
When I filtered the search, there were a few variations, a number of listings for 'commercial' products that comprised the Dongle, associated DVB-T software on a CD and a basic aerial. Interestingly there were also 2 listings for the Dongles manufactured by NewSky that had been listed specifically for users intending them for use with SDR.  As such the Dongles had been tested and the MCX sockets reinforced.

I chose the listing for the NewSky Dongle complete with a set of three aerial adaptors and have ordered for express delivery.

Next on the list was an aerial for testing.  I wanted something more than the basic 'stick' type that come as standard with a lot of the Dongles, but again, don't want to spend a lot of money until I am sure that the SDR Solution is going to meet my needs and expectations.

After spending about an hour searching through listings ranging from a couple of pounds for indoor freeview type aerials to the low hundreds for discone scanner aerials I was feeling quite confused.  I have read many times that the rule of thumb is that the aerial should outperform whatever radio you are connecting it to and therefore was probably likely to be expensive to achieve good results.  Then I remembered reading about the excellent performance of the DVB-T sticks with just the bunny ear digital aerials so I was ready just to order one of these for testing at the cost of a few pounds.

Fortunately I remembered that I had a scanner aerial left over from the equipment a couple of years ago as I could not sell it at the time.  I'll find the specs and post some pictures as soon as I can.

Great, just waiting on delivery of the eBay order now!

Which gives me time to research the software and Drivers I am going to need....