RTL-SDR Blog V4 R828D RTL2832U 1PPM TCXO SMA Software Defined Radio (Dongle Only)

I purchased the RTL-SDR V4 to upgrade from the V3 which I've had for over a year. I usually listen to the HF amateur bands and the V4 seems to be much better in this regard - less noise and interference and better sensitivity. I don't have a great setup - just a long-wire antenna about 13 meters long in the back garden but have heard contacts from all over the world. The unit does get very warm in use and, even though they say this is normal, so as not to shorten it's life I have attached an extra heatsink so that it now runs much cooler. I have tested it on the air bands, marine bands and commercial bands and all work just fine with clear reception. If you already have a V3 for listening to HF and are thinking of upgrading I'd suggest this is a good purchase especially for the price. There is less benefit to UHF, VHF etc so if this is your usual listening range the V3 is probably already more than adequate.

Plugged in, downloaded some software, read the manual, plugged in an antenna, done. Working really well. Doesn’t get too warm, great value for money. Signals are clear, I did buy an LNA too, this helped reduce the gain settings. It will be use for a longer cable run I’m planning. So far all good, if you want to get into SDR, it’s a great starting point.

Easy set up , now workinh well picking up Meteor Sats ( M23/M24) on 137.900Mhz with my QFH Antenna // 73's MA3360SWL / JO01di-Essex Uk.

Works as expected and is identical to the ones I got from the official outlet on Aliexpress where they are £11 cheaper, requiring only patience for delivery. There are a few niggles with the design - The SMA connector is set back on the PCB a couple of mm which means if you tighten the SMA nut, you will be pulling on the solder joints. The extruded case has screw mouldings on all four corners but they chose to only put two screws in each endplate to save pennies and these are coarse self-tappers that shed particles of aluminium swarf every time you undo them and why they chose countersunk heads in a non-countersunk plate is a mystery. I wanted to panel mount a few of these dongles but the SMA is too short to be able to poke it through and add another nut for proper grounding, again it's that bizarre set-back on the PCB. It's pot luck whether you receive a dongle with the USB plug soldered on straight.

Great little SDR, combine it with a switch box and your TRX to beat the ever increasing noise levels !

This is a very affordable SDR. It isn’t exactly plug and play and took some googling to set up but I’m not an expert and for the price should expect to have to put in a bit of work to get it set up. So far I’m really happy with it and it can be used with a range of different sdr software

Nice I’ve got a few but this especially with dsdplus paid version works well but there more info on it look it up Outdoor antenna works well

Tried to get it to work on a Raspberry Pi 4. Two operating systems tested (using CubcSDR) - Trixie and Bookworm. Didn't work at all on Bookworm, and Trixie was unreliable. Nooelec alternative runs fine, same hardware and software, so I know this unit is faulty. Maybe just an unlucky unit?

Thank u for Seller services

ラズパイ５に使用し 普通に使えます

Funcionou perfeitamente

Funciona muy bien aunque si es muy necesaria una buena antena al exterior,

Working great so far although its not exactly "plug and play" (which I expected) .. I'm using a Pi3 with the PI-SDR image. Works great with SDR++ on the image. The one issue I'm having is not being able to pickup AM broadcast bands. I suspect thats antenna related but not sure yet. This has been fun to play around with. Not allot going in my area with uv- vf so cant comment on that yet. I have a MLA-30+ antenna coming soon. Will update here more after that. I can say its definitely an improvement over ver 3 just because of the increased coverage. Looking forward to installing on a android tablet . Update - works great. Overall .. these are cludgy to use compared to a dedicated radio, but fun and allow you to learn and experiment with several spectrums of RF. I was finally able to get AM but ended up installing and using on a Win11 machine. You will probably want to set up multiple antennas to use with one of these. The MLA 30+ works great on HF and lower bands but truly doesnt perform well at all above 30 MHz (expected). For that I'm going to try a simple setup with a DPDT switch and use a long wire (by long I mean about 15 feet strung along the floor). The ability to go lower in the bands makes this a worthwhile purchase. I never went the route of the upconverter before because of the added cost and hassle . Plenty to experiment with and learn. Now that I feel like I have the antenna situation addressed and have a baseline I can start tweaking the software and bookmarking stations. Nice to have good sounding stereo FM radio available on my PC setup as well. I still have a couple things I want to try - like going portable in the camper, completing a comparison of SD# and SD++, things like that. This thing will keep me busy for a while.