While the standard R820T dongles are the cheapest, most popular and best overall performing, there are other lesser known dongles variants out there which contain RTL2832 chips. Gough Lui has reviewed two lesser known dongles with Belling Lee (PAL) connectors on his blog.
One dongle uses the FC0013 tuner, and the other uses the R820T chip. Gough opens the dongles up and inspects their electronics and gives his opinions on the design.
A user on the SDR# Google Groups forum has posted a program based on ADSB# called TVSharp, which can be used to watch analogue PAL and NTSC TV using the rtl-sdr dongle. Download TVSharp directly here (Mirror 1) (Old Version Mirror 2 (with source)).
The rtl-sdr as a software defined radio actually does not have enough bandwidth to receive a PAL or NTSC signal properly. PAL and NTSC signals require more than double the 2MHz typical bandwidth of the rtl-sdr. But, a decent black and white signal can still be obtained by using some of the luminance part of the signal. As only part of the signal is sampled, resolution will be lost. Also, as sound is broadcast on a separate frequency, a second rtl-sdr dongle will be required to receive the matching audio.
On YouTube, users Superphish and ek6rc have posted videos showing TVSharp in action.
