Another L-Band Antenna Build and comparing L-Band reception on the RTL-SDR, HackRF and SDRplay

Over on Reddit user killmore231 has made a post showing his comparison of L-Band reception with RTL-SDR, HackRF and SDRplay software defined radios. killmore231 built the L-band patch antenna which Adam 9A4QV showed how to build on his YouTube channel late last month.

When testing the antenna on his RTL-SDR he saw no reception of any L-band signals at all. The RTL-SDR requires an external LNA to properly receive signals at this frequency range, which he did not have. Next he tried it on his HackRF and saw that some signals were weakly visible. When he tried it on his SDRplay the L-band satellite signals were clearly visible, probably due to the SDRplay’s good sensitivity at this frequency range and the fact that it has a built in LNA. His results show that the SDRplay is a good SDR for receiving L-band satellites as it does not need an external LNA for decent reception. An external LNA may still be needed if a long run of coax cable is used however.