New Products in Our Store: Wideband LNA + Spare V3 Metal Enclosures

We've just released two new products in our store. The first is a low cost general purpose wideband LNA and the second is some spare RTL-SDR V3 aluminum enclosures. The wideband LNA is currently available for shipping from our Chinese warehouse and will be available on Amazon in a few days time. It costs US$17.95 including worldwide free shipping. The spare aluminum enclosure is only available from our Chinese warehouse and costs US$5.95.

Please Click Here to Visit our Store

Wideband LNA

The Wideband LNA is based on the Qorvo SPF5189Z LNA chip (datasheet pdf) which has the following declared specs:

  • Frequency range of 50 MHz to 4000 MHz
  • Noise figure = 0.6dB @ 900 MHz
  • OIP3 = 39.5 dBm @ 900 MHz
  • P1 Saturation = 22.7 dBm @ 1960 MHz
  • Gain = 18.7 dB @ 900 MHz

Compared to most of the other SPF5189Z LNAs found on eBay, our wideband LNA comes standard with a full conductive metal case, includes ESD protection on the antenna input, and is by default powered via 3 - 5V bias tee power. Our RTL-SDR Blog V3 dongles have a 4.5V bias tee built in, so they can be used to power this LNA. Direct power can be enabled simply by changing a jumper position, and removing the metal case.

This is a general purpose wideband LNA. It is useful for reducing the noise figure and thus increasing SNR, and for overcoming coax loss on all supported frequencies between 50 - 4000 MHz. However, because it is wideband you may need additional filtering if you have strong overloading signals in your area. If you're mostly interested in improving ADS-B reception, then we instead recommend our Triple Filtered ADS-B LNA which is also available at our store. The specs of the SPF5189Z are similar to that of PGA-103+ or PSA4-5043+ based LNAs. In the image slider below we compare the gain with the LNA4ALL which is a PSA4-5043+ based LNA.

Spare Aluminum Enclosure

The second product is some spare RTL-SDR Blog V3 aluminum enclosure. A few readers of this blog contacted us as they found RTL-SDR V3 enclosures to be a good fit (after being cut down to size) for home made filters, other LNAs and for FlightAware dongles. Our spare enclosures come with two SMA side panels, and one USB side panel. There is only limited stock of this product at the moment. Note that we're not including a thermal pad, since FlightAware dongles do not require additional cooling since they operate at 1.09 GHz. Additional cooling via thermal pad is only needed for stable operation when using RTL-SDRs above ~1.5 GHz.

Subscribe
Notify of
guest

27 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Paul

How well do these work at the top end of HF, say from 20MHz up? The product shows lower coverage to 50MHz but the chip spec only has performance graphs and data down to 800MHz so maybe someone with experience of this amp can comment please?

Mustafa GÜMÜŞ

I couldn’t find any information about this LNA minimum discernable signal level (minimum detectable signal level). and also SNR. I bought from your official store. Any info for input sensitivity levels p

Shilov

Hello,
What is the purpose of the BT OFF/BT ON jumper?
What should be the Vcc value?
Why is all this missing from the description?

Oleg

Hello, I have this question: I Plugged the LNA to rtl-sdr v3, turned on the beas tree power, the power indicator on the Board lit up. But there is no power on the output side of the antenna connection. Does this mean that the LNA is faulty?

tim

You should be ok. The bias T is powering the LNA pcb. The same voltage should NOT be passing thru into the antenna.

Oleg

Thanks. You’ve calmed me down a little. Should it heat up during operation? I don’t feel any heat on the case and I don’t notice any gain either. Both when the gain is removed on rtl sdr v3 and when it is active on the dongle. Can you tell me how to test LNA? Maybe there is some link where I can read about it?

Tim_rtd

Well, I’d say that’s an issue. The V3’s get very warm. The LNA’s normally don’t get warm as I have noticed.
Test LNA?? Well start a radio app and look at the base line of the spectrum. Do it with and without the LNA. There should be about 20-30db change in level on the spectrum. Unless your in Siberia, I think you should be able to see something with or without the LNA

Oleg

No, I’m in the South of Russia. Stavropol. Unfortunately, I think my LNA doesn’t work or doesn’t work correctly. I tune in to the Atis of the nearest airport, hear the signal of the automatic informant, set the LNA and the signal completely disappears with or without power. When the power is connected, the overall noise level of the ether increases slightly, but there is still no useful signal. Turn off the LNA and immediately hear ATIS again. Apparently I was unlucky ((Hello from Russia!))

Tim_rtd

Greetings Oleg. Does your LNA actually have a led indicator on it? and are you inserting it in the correct orientation? Sorry I have to ask…the “rf in” goes to the antenna..The LNA will block rf if no power…

Oleg

That’s right, “rf in” to the antenna, “rf out 5v” to the dongle. When activating beas tee, the led indicator lights up, but in sdr# I see just noise, no useful signal, only strong fm stations I see, with a weakened signal. Weaker transmitters disappear altogether. When the LNA is disabled, weak stations appear again on the waterfall. The LNA does not heat up at all during operation, all elements of the Board remain cold((

tim_rtd

I’d say the LNA is bad then..Or the LNA is for a different freq range. Typical 1-2000MHZ, but they do sell units just for L band….etc….

Oleg

I have this: wideband lna 50mhz-4ghz spf5189z. in any case, thank you for trying to help me. Good luck with everything. I guess I was just unlucky.

robert

hi, I’ve bought LNA but i have same problem, did you found solution? I think that LNA doesn’t work…

Zahier

Hi, new to this whole engineering aspect;
“Direct power can be enabled simply by changing a jumper position, and removing the metal case.”
what do you mean by that?

Simon

Hmmm…Typo? “The Wideband LNA is based on the Qorvo SPF4189Z LNA chip”
Isn’t it the SPF5189Z?
It has slightly better specs than the PSA4-5043+; Lower Noise, Higher Linearity but the 5043 has ESD protection on die.

Brian H.

I hope that Amazon has these back in stock soon!

stunted.goblin

Hi! What is the current draw please? I would like to use with HackRF which provides 50mA.
Thanks!

Simon

In the datasheet, it sais between 75 and 105mA (typically 90mA)
https://www.qorvo.com/products/d/da001910

So you will have to feed it externaly or add a BiasT inserter

Phil

Got mine 2 days ago. Solid performer, very nice case, adapter included and green LED to show power to the unit. Unbeatable value! Thanks!

Ruben EA5BZ

GREAT !!!
Will we have a 137.5 Mhz LNA + BPF ?
Thank’s !

vsonnier

Congratulations  admin ! Now waiting for your wideband loop amplifier/antenna 🙂 because random wire is really terrible in town/flats here and I want to finally use my SDRPlay RSP2 below 30Mhz properly…

Max

Something like the Japanese BCL-LOOP13 but at the rtl-sdr blog’s price 🙂

Max

uhmm… i failed to ask you to use for the next dongles series a metal enclosure with at least one flat side to allow easy cooling connecting it to a heatsink or any metal surface.

James

Hello,
From what I understand from the graph, the Lna4all has slightly more gain. Is that correct? Does it mean that for most frequencies the Lna4all is better?
How does it perform compared to cheap LNAs from China?
Regards,
James.

James

Hello,
Thanks for your explanation.
Where is the best place to put the FM Trap filter? In between the antenna and the LNA or in between the LNA and the receiver? I’ve see both answers on the Internet. What’s your point of view?
Thanks for your help.
Regards,
James