Airspy New Year Competition: Comment to win Airspy and SpyVerter Prizes!
The team behind the Airspy have given us permission to give away three Airspy related prizes for the New Year Holidays! The first prize is an Airspy R2 + Spyverter, the second prize is an Airspy Mini + Spyverter and the third prize is a Spyverter.
The Airspy is a high performance yet low cost software defined radio with a 12-bit ADC and tuning range between 24 – 1800 MHz. It is an attractive device as its dynamic range exceeds all other SDRs in a similar price range. Its performance begins to approach that of the very high end expensive SDRs. High dynamic range means that weak and strong signals can coexist in the received spectrum without any overload occurring. We have previously written reviews of the Airspy R2 and Airspy Mini on our blog.
The Spyverter is a high performance upconverter that allows the Airspy to tune to LF/MW/HF frequencies between DC – 30 MHz. The Spyverter perfectly compliments an Airspy device as it is also a very high dynamic range device. It also works perfectly with the bias tee on our RTL-SDR.com V1/V2/V3 dongles. We previously reviewed the Spyverter here.
More information about these products can be found at airspy.com.
How to Enter
Competition is now finished. Winners will be announced and emailed shortly. Thanks to all who entered!
Winners:
Larry (Airspy R2 + SV)
If I am going to win something from this one stuff, me build internet remote receiver on hill in central Europe (CZ) for all readers and fans of rtl-sdr.com website, generally for all RTL SDR enthusiasts….. :-)))
Pour Felicitér 2017
Larry (Ladislav)
kevin (Airspy Mini + SV)
been a ham a couple years now. their are so many uses for sdr’s ! it’s so cool. just looking down the list of others comments, i was like ‘oh ya’ forgot about that idea. awhile back we did a demo at our ham club with a el cheapo sdr and it sparked some interest , would like to play around with some of the newest toys, worlds of diff in capabilities. ultimate goal is to find the right one for the clubs emergency trailer. seeing the bands and whats going on, is priceless 🙂
Josh (SpyVerter)
I’d love to finally get into the HF band!
The winners were randomly selected using random.org, and all have now been emailed. If you’re a winner, please check your email and spam folder just in case.
Thank you all for participating! It’s really great to see all the variety in what projects people are doing. There were about 500 valid entries resulting in about a 0.6% chance of winning. Keep an eye out for future contests!
Simply make a comment on this post explaining what you’d do like to do with an Airspy or Spyverter if you won one.
PLEASE MAKE SURE TO ENTER YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS IN THE COMMENT FORM.
The address will only be visible to us, and we promise not to use it for any other purpose.
Rules: The winners will be selected at random. One entry per person only. You must legally be allowed to receive the prize.
Draw closes in one week on 3 January 2017, 11:59PM UTC Time.
Just to see and listen all RF signals we have around us
I would use it to o out mobile with my computer to log aviation frequencies and decode DMR
Gee, Brain, what do you want to do with an Airspy?
The same thing we do every night, Pinky – try to listen the world!
Improving the existing (modified) rtl dongle. ATM using it as a crude spectrum analyzer and occasional pan-adapter. Up-converter should improve performance.
If I win Airspy I will try it on remote location on the hill, with remote computer controlled over internet.
I’d start with QRM hunting, tracking down all of the RF interference around my house! Then I’d move on to decoding some of the signals that can be found outside of the amateur spectrum.
Playing with rtl-sdr sticks since few years now, i would like to try new horizons in decoding hight quality meteo images that require a bandwidth higher than our standard “cheap” devices (3Mbps and more).
The HF side will also be very nice, allowing me to receive by my side the long distance qso, avoiding me to use websdr’s.
Thank you, and keep making good hardware ! 🙂
Regards.
Since I already own one, I would give it to my colleague at work as a post Christmas present. There is nothing better that inviting in another person into the beautiful world of SDR. His wife though, will probably not appreciate this. 🙂
Learn more about RF, thanks!
Hi,
Last year i started playing around with satellite Signals ( especially Thuraya ) and my RTL-SDR failed me at those frequencies. I still have materials from last time to build a bigger & better helix antenna, i’d enjoy working on that again.
Since i live in Munich i’d use the spyverter to listen in on ham radio users from Switzerland and the lake of constance, i always enjoy listening to them talk about the weather and the view.
Happy Holidays everyone!
I’d like the opportunity to review the Airspy systems, with respect to HF digital mode decoding work.
Postgraduate researcher creating a testbed to prove a theory/algorithm in real life implementation. I try to keep the cost as low as possible. With the airspy and spyverter I could perform measurements I could not otherwise and possibly invest more money to buy a bunch more for a real life application.
I would use this for my Senior Design Project which is redundant RF communications. My group needs an SDR to prove that our project is working. We are going to jam one frequency and watch as the data stream switches automatically to another transceiver operating on another frequency. The SDR will show what is happening in real time.
It would be a dream come true, to exchange my current RTL2832U dongle and catch all those signals that are currently eluding my setup.
A dream of my young years – to receive all! It only remains to have good ideas and build an antennas!
I ordered an AirSpy Mini myself just this past week; I plan on using it with my VHF (weather + Amsat Mode J) satellite reception setup. I am currently using a ThumbNet N3, which is lower noise than RTL dongle, but has some annoying images and spurs.
If I had a *second* AirSpy and/or Spyverter, I would use it for my favorite HF activities:
* Monitoring digital communications on the 40, 30 and 20 meter bands (I am one of those hams that does a lot more listening than talking)
* Listening to international broadcasters.
* Use it as a monitor receiver for 15, 12 and 10 meters so that I know when the DX is coming in. (When I do talk as a ham, I really like to “work the skip” on 10 meters SSB).
continue work on cracking outernet and other satellite data streams
What I would do?
Probably finally start to try and receive all the wireless weather station, energy meter, remote door signals. Basically just utilize it somehow in my home automation system.
A Ham without a Ham station. Happy New Year for All….73´s from PP8KWA.
Hi,at the moment I have a generic blue R820T2 dongle that I use for
receiving weathersats,2mtr/70cm ham band,small sats in the 70cm band,
ISS,L band.On my To do list is getting a upconverter for shortwave reception.
A Airspy +/or Spyverter would be a great improvement over what I now use.
Also: Best wishes to you all for the new year 73
If I win I will explore the vlf part of the spectrum like wspr on 630m, 2200m, radio time signals, NDB beacons and so on.
I’d love to share one with some friends and get them interested in the signals around them!
Me me me!
Hi! This is just what we’re looking for to put in the observatory’s ham shack. We have some antennas that are ready to use this and all we need is the airspy r2 and spyverter to get us in the game. We currently are using the rtl-sdr dongles for APRS into a pi3, but this opens up a whole new world for us. Ideally, we want to make this combination available to any of our members and volunteers who would like to use this over the internet.
I would use it to pick up all kinds of interesting signals!
Would like to build coherent receiver as well as use it for HF.
I would use it to receive noaa weather satellites.
I would like to receive HF bands and NOAA images.
It’d be my fist SDR radio and I’d use it in addition to my old Sony ICF-SW7600.
I would use this gear for low cost Spectrum analyzer projects.
I’d like to set up a public web SDR using OpenWebRX in a low noise environment.
Would love to tie this in with GPS defined clock and use with my other sdr to create a beam steering array
In my country – Vietnam, there are so many fishermen, and their life rely on the little amount of income base on fishing. Go to offshore region that mean no telephone signal, the only wave they can communicate with the shore station is from the HF transceiver on board. However, they are all analog devices, and the same with the offshore transceivers, so all the weather forecast, storm notification or contact to their home all done manually.
With a AirSpy2 and a Spyverter, I will build an automate station working on HF band that frequently transmit weather forecast to offshore fishing vessels help them to have a reliable and latest news from mainland.
would like to learn more about SDR and applying ADSB receiver
It would be great to use one of these to decode weather sat images and amateur cubesats.
If I win, I will use it doing some research for RF data acq of new Galileo sat to verify a possibility of using raw IF data (as little as possible) to get current position (mixed with GPS and Galileo). A concept of “PUSH and GET” position app in cell phone will be developed (in order to meet E911) basic on this research. This method will resolve the issue of battery usage of cell phone if GPS is tracking.
Get into HF, have only RTL right now.
I’d be interested in one of these very much…
Current rig consists of one cheapest chinese dongle, i can only imagine what those can do. Especially in LF/MW/HF frequencies.
Replace my RTL-SDR for HF reception.
Hola. Megustaria poder seguir investigado el mundo de la radifrecuencia.
Gracias