Simon,
I agree with your assessment. Using SDR on satellites is a wonderful thing. I have been assessing the value of SDR on satellites for several months and my personal conclusion is that it's benefits far outweigh the negatives. I'll be writing up my notes for a short column soon.
I'm quite spoiled using my FUNcube Dongle Pro+ to receive. It does a great job, allowing me to see the entire passband of all our current satellite fleet. Not only can I visually see the passband, I am recording it in both AF+RF so that I can go back and look for things I might have missed during a previous satellite pass.
My biggest complaint about using the SDR setup is having to switch cables depending on by transmit band. I'm looking for clean solutions to switch between U/V and V/U configurations, giving me the best isolation and protection for my SDR devices from the transmitter.
Some folks don't like the short delay effect using SDR. I find it is manageable and can be "tweaked" for optimum performance.
73 Clayton W5PFG
On Thu, Dec 25, 2014 at 10:26 AM, Simon Brown [email protected] wrote:
Hi Wouter,
Many thanks and also thanks to Ken. I’m currently sorting out the station on the FO-29 passes, mainly debugging the software.
FWIW I am using a NetSDR + Down-converter (from RFspace) on RX and a TS-2000 on TX. Using the SDR on RX is so much better than flying blind IMO J . I need to get some cables ordered to I can easily switch between 2m and 70cms, when I do this I’ll start with AO-73.
Simon Brown G4ELI http://v2.sdr-radio.com