Category: News

New Upcoming Crowdfunded SDRs from Wavelet Lab: xSDR and sSDR

Thank you to Andrew from Wavelet Lab, the original creators of uSDR and xMASS SDR, for writing in and sharing news about two of their soon-to-be-released SDR hardware products, xSDR and sSDR. 

If you are unfamiliar with Wavelet Labs' previous products, uSDR is a small M.2 SDR board based on the Lime LMS6002D chip. It has both TX and RX capabilities, a 300 - 3700 MHz tuning range, and up to 28 MHz of bandwidth. xMASS, on the other hand, uses multiple modular 'xSDR' boards to create an up to 8x8 MIMO receiver. Previously, xSDR was only available for purchase with an xMASS board, but the new crowdfunding campaign makes xSDR available as a standalone product.

Andrew summarizes:

xSDR - a compact SDR module derived from the xMASS SDR (2 RX / 2 TX). We’ve seen many requests for the module itself, so we decided to make it available as a standalone product.

We add that xSDR has 2x2 MIMO RX/TX capabilities, an extended tuning range of 30 MHz to 3.8 GHz, and a channel bandwidth of up to 90 MHz. It retains the same M.2 connector and form factor as the uSDR. 

sSDR - an M.2 form-factor SDR covering up to 11 GHz. This is our most ambitious bet so far, as there’s currently no comparable alternative on the market in this price range (~$1k).

sSDR has even higher rated specs, with 2x2 MIMO RX/TX capabilities, a tuning range of 30 MHz to 11 GHz, and a bandwidth of up to 120 MHz.

Andrew notes that xSDR is due to be released at the end of January, and sSDR in March.

xSDR (top) and sSDR (bottom)

New RTL-SDR Blog Forum Active

We've just activated a brand new RTL-SDR Blog forum based on the Discourse platform, and we will be retiring the old phpBB boards. If you have any questions or want to share anything relating to RTL-SDRs, SDRs, or the radio hobby in general, please feel free to log on and make a post.

For troubleshooting questions, please be sure to include as much detail as possible about the issue, such as exact error messages, what you are trying to achieve, and ideally add screenshots showing your settings. Also, please remember that for questions relating to specific software, you will probably get the best help by asking in discussion groups specifically for that software, or by emailing the authors of those programs directly.

We've decided to retire the old phpBB forums due to excessive spam that has proved extremely difficult to combat. phpBB has limited plugins available that actually work for spambot detection. We've tried adding captchas, technical barrier questions, using spambot block lists, spambot blocking services, and setting a high security setting on Cloudflare. But nothing has been able to stop the new ChatGPT/AI powered spambots.

These spambots are particularly insidious because they ask legitimate-sounding questions to start a discussion and may even reply with legitimate-sounding responses. Later, once trust has been established with humans and the forum spambot detection software, they will start posting spam links, and editing old posts to include subtle spam links.

The new forums are based on Discourse, and are available here https://rtl-sdr.discourse.group/

Based on our previous experience, Discourse is a much more modern platform and has much better natural spambot protection, so spambots shouldn't be a problem on that platform.

If you've been a fan of these forums, please make an account on our Discourse forum. Thanks!

As usual, for inquiries relating to RTL-SDR Blog product faults, or shipping issues, please email us directly at [email protected] with your order ID number included for direct help.

The old forums will stay up for archival reasons, but they will be locked from now on.

An Overview of 2025 SDR Black Friday Deals

Below, we're collating the best Black Friday sales we could find on SDR and related products.

If you find any other good sales for SDR or related products, please post in the comments!

RTL-SDR Blog

We're currently offering $5 of V3 dongles (including the V3c) on Amazon. The sale will last until Monday 1 December, and only while stocks last.

RTL-SDR Blog V3 Dongle + Antenna Kit: US$47.95 US$42.95 (Link)
RTL-SDR Blog V3 Dongle Only: US$37.95 US$32.95 (Link)
RTL-SDR Blog V3c Dongle Only: US$39.95 US$34.95 (Link)

We also want to add that in December, the price of V4 dongles will be raised, due to rising chip costs, and dwindling R828D stockpiles, so buying now is purchasing while essentially on sale.

We're also participating in the Airspy 25% sale with the YouLoop listing on our store. The sale takes the price down from $39.95 to $29.96.

Airspy

Airspy offers low-cost RX-only SDRs. Airspy is holding a 25% off Black Friday sale. Black Friday is usually their biggest discount of the year. The sale is offered by their official iTead store and by most resellers. Links to their sales are platforms available here https://airspy.com/purchase

Airspy R2: US$169.00 $126.75
Airspy Mini: US$99.00 US$74.25
Airspy HF+ Discovery: US$169.00 US$126.75
Airspy SpyVerter R2: US$49.00 US$36.75

SDRPlay

SDRplay offers low-cost RX-only SDRs. There do not appear to be any direct Black Friday deals from SDRplay, but on Ham Radio Outlet, the SDRplay nRSP-ST and DUO units are on sale. The RSPdx-R2 and RSP1B appear not to be on sale.

SDRplay nRSP-ST: $499.95 $399.95
SDRplay DUO: $299.95 $249.95

FlexRadio

FlexRadio offers high-end SDRs aimed at ham radio users. They are currently running a Black Friday deal as shown in the screenshot. https://www.flexradio.com/products/categories/black-friday/

Ham Radio Prep Course

While not physical SDRs, some people interested in getting their amateur radio licence in the US may be interested in this study course, which is discounted for Black Friday. https://hamradioprep.com/black-friday

They have various course bundles on sale, but this screenshot is of the full bundle.

Two YouTube Reviews of the new PortaRF – A New HackRF Portapack Combo

Recently, OpenSourceSDRLab, a Chinese store and lab that sells existing SDR products, and some unique products of their own design, has started taking pre-orders for their new "PortaRF" product. 

The PortaRF melds the HackRF and Portapack into a single PCB. They advertise it as an evolution of the PortaPack H4M, which is their popular clone of the original PortaPack, upgraded from the original. The PortaPack H4M has become one the most recommended HackRF PortaPack options on the market, even surpassing the original HackRF PortaPack, due to its high quality, excellent features, and significantly lower cost compared to the original.

The PortaRF features several improvements, including a larger 4" IPS screen compared to the 3.2" non-IPS screen on the H4M, increased flash storage from 1MB to 2MB, a higher internal battery capacity of 3000 mAh, and the addition of a new joystick control. Interestingly, OpenSourceSDRLab has also indicated that the production version may come with an AI module, which will allow the PortaRF to respond to voice commands.

The PortaRF is expected to ship around November 20, and it costs US$220, shipped from China. In comparison, the PortaPack H4M sells for US$165, shipped from China.

Recently, two reviews of the PortaRF were uploaded to YouTube. The first is by TechMinds, which provides an overview of the features and opens it up, showing the internals.

PortaRF - A NEW HackRF PortaPack Combo In One Single Board

The second review is from sn0ren who also reviews the features, and shows the internals. Sn0ren also makes some notes about his likes and dislikes with the new design.

HackRF Portapack Evolved? This is PortaRF

VU GPSDR: An RTL-SDR Expansion Board for the Vivid Single Board Computer

Thank you to Shawn from UUGear for writing in and sharing with us news about the release of "VU GPSDR" an RTL-SDR expansion board for the "Vivid Unit" single board computer. The Vivid single-board computer (SBC) is based on the RK3399 CPU (same chip used on the Orange Pi 4), and comes with a built-in 5.5" touchscreen.

The VU GPSDR is an expansion board for the Vivid Unit that, when combined with a VU Extender board, sits on the back of the Vivid Unit, transforming the computing platform into a portable SDR capable of running software like their fork of SDR++ or an OpenStreetMap display of live ADS-B aircraft positions.

The VU GPSDR also integrates a GPSDO (GPS disciplined oscillator), with a built-in GPS patch antenna, for precise frequency tuning. It also comes with a built-in HF upconverter and two encoder wheels, presumably customizable, but primarily for tuning and volume control. Finally, they have also integrated a software-controlled frequency output port for experimenters.

The Vivid Unit costs €99.00 (approximately US$115) on its own. The Vivid Unit Extender, which is required for using expansion boards, costs €25.00 (approximately US$29). The VU GPSDR itself costs €65.00 (approximately US$75). So, in total, for a complete RTL-SDR system, you are looking at a total cost of €189 (US$220).

Shawn has also recently sent us a review sample, which we will be testing out and writing a review for within the next week, so stay tuned for that!

The VU GPSDR Expansion Board for the Vivid Unit Single Board Computer
The VU GPSDR Expansion Board for the Vivid Unit Single Board Computer

NOAA 15 and 19 To Be Decommissioned Within the Next Two Weeks

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have recently announced that they are planning to decommission NOAA 15 and NOAA 19 on August 12, 2025 and August 19, 2025 respectively.

Update #7: NOAA has completed End of Life (EOL) testing activities for NOAA-15 and NOAA-19 and will commence the decommission process shortly. These two remaining satellites in the NOAA Polar Operational Environmental Satellites (POES) Constellation are far beyond their primary mission design life. All have incurred subsystem and instrument degradation or failures and have entered a "twilight phase" where failure modes are increasingly likely. As a reminder, NOAA-18 was decommissioned on June 6, 2025 at 1740 UTC due to an unrecoverable failure to the S-Band transmitter. The remaining satellites in the legacy POES constellation will be decommissioned as follows: NOAA-15 on August 12, 2025 and NOAA-19 on August 19, 2025.

NOAA-15, NOAA-18, and NOAA-19 have long been core satellites for RTL-SDR users. For many of us, one of these would have been the first satellite from which we received weather data via the 137 MHz APT signal.

These NOAA satellites were marked end-of-life (EOL) back on June 16, 2025. However, EOL status still meant that transmissions would continue as normal. The EOL status simply marked that the satellites should no longer be used for mission-critical services, and that no attempts at repair or recovery would be made if needed.

On June 06, 2025, just before the EOL status officially went into effect, NOAA-18 was decommissioned and shut down due to a prior transmitter failure that left ground control in danger of being unable to control the satellite in the future. 

While nothing critical appears to have happened to the remaining NOAA-15 and NOAA-19 satellites as of yet, these are ageing satellites with various ongoing issues. NOAA-15 was launched in 1998, and NOAA-19 in 2009. They have long exceeded their design life.

As with NOAA-18's decommissioning, it does not appear that NOAA will deorbit the satellites. Instead, they will be left in orbit and put into a safe electrical state, with the transmitters shut down.

You can find more information about the decommissioning over on Carl Reinmann's usradioguy blog.

A Drawing of NOAA-19
A Drawing of NOAA-19

Airspy 2025 Summer Sale: 20% OFF All Airspy Products

Airspy has just announced the start of its yearly summer sale, offering 20% off all Airspy products from June 27 to June 30, 2025. The summer sale has historically only been 15% off, so this year there is an extra discount.

  • Airspy R2: US$169.00 US$135.20
  • Airspy Mini: US$99.00 US$79.20
  • Airspy HF+ Discovery: US$169.00 US$135.20
  • Airspy SpyVerter R2: US$49.00 US$39.20
  • YouLoop Antenna: US$39.95 US$31.96

The sale is active at all participating resellers, which includes our own store, where we have the YouLoop on sale for US$31.96, including free shipping to most countries worldwide (excluding tariffs!). 

We also note that recently, iTead, Airspy's manufacturing partner in China has opened a US warehouse, which means that US customers ordering from their store will not experience high tariffs. iTead sells all Airspy products, except for the YouLoop.

Some good reviews of the YouLoop include the YouTube videos done by Frugal Radio where he reviews HF reception and VLF & LF reception with an Airspy HF+, and later tests it with an RTL-SDR Blog V3 using direct sampling. Techminds also has an excellent review on his YouTube channel. 

If you're on X, be sure to retweet the sale post for a chance to win a freebie.

Airspy 2025 Summer Sale: 20% OFF
Airspy 2025 Summer Sale: 20% OFF

HackRF Pro Pre-Order: Frequency Range and RF Performance Improvements, USB-C, TCXO Added

The HackRF by Great Scott Gadgets, released in 2014, remains among the most popular software-defined radios (SDRs) on the market due to its open-source nature, affordability, wideband tuning range, wide 20 MHz bandwidth, and transmit capability.

However, over the past 10 years, very little has changed with the HackRF, with most changes only being made out of necessity due to end-of-life components. It has mostly been the open-source community and clone manufacturers innovating on the circuit.

Today, Great Scott Gadgets has finally announced the HackRF Pro.

Key improvements include expanding the lower frequency limit from 1 MHz down to 100 kHz, integrating a TCXO for enhanced frequency stability, upgrading the microUSB port to USB-C, and improving RF performance with additional shielding, a flatter frequency response, and the elimination of the DC spike. They have also added more RAM and flash memory, and added a 16-bit output mode for low sample rates.

The product is available from their usual distributors (listed on the release page) and costs US$400. Note that the HackRF Pro is currently in pre-order, with production slated to begin in July 2025 and shipping in September 2025. 

The full release article from Great Scott Gadgets reads:

HackRF Pro from Great Scott Gadgets is a Software Defined Radio peripheral capable of transmission or reception of radio signals from 100 kHz to 6 GHz. Designed to enable test and development of modern and next generation radio technologies, HackRF Pro is an open source hardware platform that can be used as a USB peripheral or programmed for stand-alone operation.

  • 100 kHz to 6 GHz operating frequency
  • Tunable from 0 Hz to 7.1 GHz
  • Half-duplex transceiver
  • Up to 20 million samples per second
  • 8-bit quadrature samples (8-bit I and 8-bit Q)
  • Compatible with GNU Radio, SDR#, and more
  • Software-configurable RX and TX gain and baseband filter
  • Software-controlled RF port power (50 mA at 3.3 V)
  • SMA RF connector
  • SMA clock input and output for synchronization and triggering
  • Convenient buttons for programming
  • Internal pin headers for expansion
  • High-Speed USB 2.0 with Type-C connector
  • USB-powered
  • Open source hardware

Compared to HackRF One, HackRF Pro introduces a host of new and updated features, including:

  • Wider operating frequency range
  • Improved RF performance with flatter frequency response
  • Modern USB Type-C connector
  • Built-in TCXO crystal oscillator for superior timing stability
  • Logic upgrade from a CPLD to a power-efficient FPGA
  • Elimination of the DC spike
  • Extended precision mode with 16-bit samples for low sample rates (typical ENOB: 9-11)
  • More RAM and flash memory for custom firmware
  • Installed shielding around the radio section
  • Trigger input and output accessible through clock connectors
  • Cutout in the PCB provides space for future add-ons
  • Improved power management

Software that works with HackRF One is already compatible with HackRF Pro. We designed HackRF Pro for backward compatibility, following the same basic architecture of HackRF One but with many small enhancements. Prior to shipping HackRF Pro, we will publish a migration guide that will show software developers how to take advantage of certain new capabilities of HackRF Pro, but out-of-the-box HackRF Pro will behave like HackRF One with superior performance. In addition to host software compatibility, our migration guide will address firmware, allowing developers to port custom firmware to the new platform and take advantage of its unique capabilities

The HackRF Pro
The HackRF Pro