Tagged: network SDR

A Review of the KiwiSDR: 10 kHz – 30 MHz Wideband Network SDR

The KiwiSDR is a 14-bit wideband RX only HF software defined radio created by John Seamons (ZL/KF6VO) which has up to 32 MHz of bandwidth, so it can receive the entire 10 kHz – 30 MHz VLF/LF/MW/HF spectrum all at once. However, it is not a typical SDR as you do not connect the KiwiSDR directly to your PC. Instead the KiwiSDR is a cape (add on board) for the Beaglebone single board computing platform. If you’re unfamiliar with the Beaglebone, it is a small computing board that is similar to a Raspberry Pi. The KiwiSDR is designed to be a low cost standalone unit that runs 24/7, connects to your HF antenna and internet network, and shares your 10 kHz – 30 MHz reception over the internet with up to 4 simultaneous users.

The KiwiSDR
The KiwiSDR

The KiwiSDR kit retails for $299 USD (Amazon) (Direct from Seeed Studio), and with that price you get the KiwiSDR cape, a Beaglebone Green board, an enclosure, microSD card and a GPS antenna. If you already have a Beaglebone lying around, then you can purchase the KiwiSDR board only for $199 USD. 

Because the KiwiSDR is a network SDR, instead of connecting it to your PC it connects to your home internet network, allowing you to access it from any computing device via a web browser. Direct access to the SDR is not possible (actually it seems that it is, but it’s not easy to do), and all the computing is performed on the KiwiSDR’s on board FPGA and Beaglebone’s CPU before being sent to the network. Thus raw ADC or IQ data is never touched by your PC, your PC only sees the compressed audio and waterfall stream. So a powerful computer is not required to run the SDR. In fact, a mobile phone or tablet will do just fine.

In comparison, a $299 USD wideband non-networked SDR such as the LimeSDR uses a 12-bit ADC and can do up to 80 MHz of bandwidth over USB 3.0. But even on our relatively powerful PC (i7-6700 CPU, Geforce GTX 970 and 32 GB RAM) the LimeSDR can only get up to about 65 MHz on SDR-Console V3 before performance becomes too choppy.

But the real reason to purchase a KiwiSDR is that it is designed to be shared and accessed over the internet from anywhere in the world. You can connect to over 137 shared KiwiSDRs right now over at sdr.hu which is a site that indexes public KiwiSDRs. To achieve internet sharing, the KiwiSDR runs a modified version of András Retzler’s OpenWebRX software. OpenWebRX is similar to WebSDR, but is open source and freely available to download online. The standard OpenWebRX is also designed to support the RTL-SDR. Of course if you don’t want to share your receiver over the internet you don’t have to, and you could use it on your own local network only.

Some applications of the KiwiSDR might include things like: setting up a remote receiver in a good noise free location, helping hams give themselves propagation reports by accessing a remote KiwiSDR while they are TXing, listening to shortwave stations, monitoring WSPR or WEFAX channels, education, crowd sourced science experiments and more.

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