Search results for: android

RFinder P10 – An Android Tablet with a built in Two Way Radio and RTL-SDR

Recently we came across a company called RFinder / AndroidDMR who are a shop selling custom made two way radios and Android Tablets with built in radio hardware. One of their new tablets that is currently in pre-order is being advertised with a built in RTL-SDR. The preorder status notes that they should be shipping within less than a months time.

The "RFinder Android Radio 10 Inch Tablet - 136-174mhz, 400-490mhz DMR/FM - Embedded RTL-SDR" is able to be pre-ordered for $1,499.95 USD + shipping. It is a ruggedized 10 inch Android tablet with a built in two way 4W VHF/UHF DMR/RF radio as well as an additional built in RTL-SDR. In terms of computing hardware, it comes with an Octa-Core 2.3 GHz CPU, 4GB RAM, 64GB ROM, and it supports cellular connectivity.

In their manual they share the following slide showing the built in RTL-SDR running the RF Analyzer Android app.

Various reviews of the RFinder P10 have been showing up on YouTube. Here is one review by Ham Radio 2.0 where the RFinder P10 is demonstrated at the Huntsville Hamfest.

New RFinder P10 Tablet with Dual Band DMR and RTL-SDR Receiver - Huntsville Hamfest

TXAdvance: An RF Transmitter Manager Android App that uses RTL-SDR

Recently we came across a new RTL-SDR app on the Google Play store called TXAdvance which appears to be designed for professional sound engineers working in TV/film/stage/music production industry. The app uses an RTL-SDR to display the RF spectrum, helping sound engineers manage the RF spectrum for all their wireless sound recording devices, ensuring there is no overlapping signals, interference or intermodulation from other transmitters that could corrupt audio.

More information about the app can be found on their website at www.compasseur.com and the app itself can be purchased from the Google Play Store.

TXAdvance RTL-SDR Android App for Profressional Sound Engineers
TXAdvance RTL-SDR Android App for Professional Sound Engineers

Visualizing RF Fields in Augmented Reality with a tinySA-Ultra or RTL-SDR and Android Smartphone

The tinySA-Ultra is an affordable handheld spectrum analyzer that can be purchased for around US$130 on Aliexpress and authorized resellers such as R&L Electronics in the USA.

Recently on YouTube Manahiyo has used his tinySA-Ultra, and combined it with an RF EMC probe and an Android smartphone to create an augmented reality RF display. This is useful for measuring and visualizing the RF power around electronic devices for example. The code is entirely open source and released on GitHub. 

Manahiyo has also released an identical version that works with RTL-SDR dongles on GitHub as well.

In the past we've also posted about Manahiyo's previous work, in which he implemented a very similar augmented reality project using an RTL-SDR.

Augmented Reality EMC Probe with a tinySA-Ultra
[RadioFieldAR -tinySA-] Visualize radio wave strength. [電波可視化]

SDRangel Now Available on Android: Mobile ADS-B, AIS, APT, Digital Voice, POCSAG, APRS, RS41 Radiosonde Decoders

SDRangel is a free open source software defined radio program that is compatible with many SDRs, including RTL-SDRs. SDRAngel is set apart from other programs because of it's huge swath of built in demodulators and decoders.

Thank you to reader Jon for writing in and noting that SDRangel has recently been released for Android as a free Google Play download. This is an amazing development that could open up many doors into portable decoding setups as the Android version supports almost every decoder implemented on the desktop version. Jon writes:

It includes most of the functionality of the desktop version of SDRangel, including:

  • AM, FM, SSB, Broadcast FM and DAB, AIS, ADS-B, Digital Voice (DMR, dPMR, D-Star, FreeDV), Video (DVB-S, DVB-S2, NTSC, PAL), VOR, LoRa, M17, Packet (AX.25), Pager (POCSAG), Radiosonde (RS41), Time signal (MSF, DCF77, TDF and WWVB) modems.
  • RTL SDR, Airspy, Airspy HF, LimeSDR, HackRF and SDRplay support via USB OTG as well as networked SDRs
  • 2D and 3D signal analysis in both time and frequency domain with statistical measurements of SNR, THD, THD+N, SINAD, SFDR and channel power
  • Satellite tracker, star tracker, maps and rotator controller

It should work on Android 6 and up. It’s a straight port of the desktop application, so although it will run on a phone, probably best used on a large tablet with a stylus or mouse.

SDRangel on Android
SDRangel on Android
SDRangel

ADS-B Radar Android App Updated with Open Street Maps

Thank you to James Mainwaring for letting us know about the latest update to his "ADS-B Radar (RTL-SDR)" Android App. The update brings an Open Street Map (OSM) display, allowing for aircraft to be directly plotted on the map.

As before the app works with an RTL-SDR directly connected to the Android device, and also has a radar like display.

James also has other apps on the Google Play store for FM Radio, Airband and Ham Radio listening.

ADS-B Radar App for Android

Open Source Military TAK Android App Supports RTL-SDR ADS-B Tracking

ATAK (Android Tactical Assault Kit) is an Android app used by some branches of the US military for visualizing geospatial information such as enemy and friendly positions, as well as any other information of interest. The civilian version of ATAK (CivTAK) was recently open sourced in 2020 and can be downloaded from the Google Play Store.

The software has a huge number of features for coordinating teams, planning operations and visualizing information. It can even network via handheld, or ham radios or a Meshtastic LoRa network if a central server and internet connection is unavailable. Of note is that their plugin page references the possibility of using a plugin that uses RTL-SDR hardware for ADS-B aircraft tracking. However, it appears that the plugin needs to be purchased from tak.gov. We suspect that in the future there will be more RTL-SDR compatible plugins available.

[First seen on Hackaday]

ATAK on an Android Device

Using an RTL-SDR to Decode Broadcast FM RDS Data on Android

Over on YouTube Double A Labs has posted a new video demonstrating how to use an RTL-SDR and Android device to receive broadcast FM stations, and to decode any associated RDS data. 

In the video Double A uses the SDR Touch Android app and the Advanced RDS function to show the RDS information. He goes on to explain the various pieces of information RDS data provides including clock time, active RDS groups and alternative frequencies.

Tune broadcast FM radio and decode Radio Data System (RDS) information using your Android phone and an RTL-SDR USB (see parts list below). RDS can include station identification, song name, the current time for a receiver to sync its clock, alternative frequencies the same program is on, and more!

Tuning FM Radio & Decoding RDS Data on ANDROID using RTL-SDR USB

SignalsEverywhere: Review of SDR++ on Android

In our last post we mentioned that a 'pre-release' public version of SDR++ for Android was recently released. Now over on the SignalsEverywhere YouTube channel Sarah has uploaded a new video where she reviews and demonstrates the new SDR++ Android App. 

In the video Sarah demonstrates how to connect and start a SDR, shows SDR++ in action, then tests listening to NOAA weather audio reports, Inmarsat reception via the bias tee support, P25 and broadcast FM. She also shows how it's possible to use the split screen multitasking feature on Android to send audio from SDR++ into APRSdroid for APRS decoding.

She goes on to show how to fine tune the screen PPI resolution for different sized devices, and how to set up multi-VFO listening on the HF bands. Next, she compares the audio decoding quality between SDR++, SDRTouch and RFAnalyzer. Finally she shows that a HackRF running at a wideband 20 MHz of bandwidth can run smoothly. 

The Android SDR App That Beats Them All! Supports RTL-SDR Airspy HackRF and Many More!