Following the advice of Claudio Re I1RFQ and Ivan Guerini IW2KBK I spent some time in developing an ExtIO_H101.dll.

This dll follows the Alberto di Bene Winrad specifications for the external I/O DLL.

It allows the use of the H101 SDR receiver with many of the SDR applications that implement the ExtIO standard,

ie: HDSDR, SDRsharper, WinradF...

The last version is: ver 0.13

Here you can download the ExtIO_H101_013.zip  The archive contains the ExtIO_H101.dll ver 0.13

The MD5 hash file signature is c9eaf93506e31afbc1f2d7c3284d2897

It operates with OS in Italian or English

While ExtIO_H101_012.zip runs on English PC.   The archive contains the ExtIO_H101.dll ver 0.12 

The MD5 hash file signature is dfb4a46321dc8380191b6ee98f1c3db3

Copy Extio_H101.dll file into the SDR application directory and then select the ExtIO_H101 from the SDR application setup.

The source code is at www.github.com/ik1xpv/ExtIO_H101

The dll is under development and it is not fully tested, you will use it at your own risk.  

It has been tested in Windows 10, 8, 7 OS with HDSDR, SDRsharper.

Have you fun!

Here after some pictures from Ivan:

 

 

 

 

 

The hack 0.9 describes how to modify a RTL2832U+R820T dongle as RF generator.

I connected the generator to two RTL2832U+R820T receivers and I assumed the generator to be in the 0.5-1.5GHz range as indicated by the receivers screens.

That is not correct because the RTL_SDR receiver is sensitive to even harmonics of the tuning frequency.

The generator output is in the VCO range 1.770 - 3.54 GHz.

The error became evident when I connected the generator to a R&S FSV spectrum analyzer and got the following measures:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Spectrum analyzer settings: Center Frequency 1.8 GHz ; Span 3.6 GHz, Att 10dB.

 

 

Generator SDR# tune: 1GHz,

output spectrum: 2.0GHz (2x)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Generator SDR# tune: 0.9GHz,

output spectrum: 1.8GHz (2x)

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

Generator SDR# tune: 1.4 GHz,

output spectrum: 2.8GHz (2x)

 

 

 

 

 

When the generator is tuned to lower frequency the VCO is tuned to higher harmonics (power of 2).

Generator SDR# tune: 0.5 GHz,

output spectrum: 2.0 GHz ( 4x)

 

 

 

 

 

 

The generated signal is weak while clean.

 

The RTL2832+R820T RF GENERATOR hack 0.9

RTL-SDR is a very cheap software defined radio that uses a DVB-T TV tuner dongle based on the RTL2832U chipset.
The most common today RTL-SDR dongle contains two primary chips: the Raphael Micro R820T radio tuner and than the Realtek RTL2832U which contains an 8-bit ADC and USB data pump.
During last year the R820T chip has been substituted by the R820T2 with a little better receiver performance.
I bought some R820T2 dongles and I needed a RF generator in the GHz range for comparison.
I investigated the possibility to modify a RTL2832U+R820T dongle to use it as a Radio Frequency Generator and hereafter the results.

The R820T block diagram shows that the internal VCO has no output pin.

The idea is to use the pin 5 (Det2) that is related to the mixer output. Of course it is not thought to be a RF output, nevertheless part of VCO signal is routed out.

WARNING the modified dongle is no more a RTL-SDR receiver.

It becames a RF generator in the 500-1500 MHz range. ( see Update 1.0 )

The hardware modification is:

• remove the input capacitor C13 ;
• remove the bypass capacitor C22 ;
• remove the protection diode D6 ;
• wire a capacitor 100pF connecting the Antenna input (D6 pad) to the pin 5 of R820T (ex C22 pad).

Options:

• remove the IR receiver (not used)
• replace the blue led with other color (red) to easy recognize the generator modified dongle.

Refer to the following pictures of the hardware modification.

  

The following screenshots has been saved while using a RT2832U+R820T2 dongle as receiver and the modified RT2832U+R820T dongle as generator. Generator and Receiver are connected via a coax cable .

( NOTE: the RTL_SDR receiver is sensitive to harmonics of the tuning frequency. The generator output is in the VCO range 1.8 - 3 GHz. See Update1.0 )

Notice the DVB-T signal reception on the left.

The RF generator has an usable range of 500-1500MHz and the output level is a little weak.

That is not correct! why the RTL_SDR receiver is sensitive to even harmonics of the tuning frequency.The generator output is in the VCO range 1.8 - 3 GHz. See Update 1.0

Future ideas:
The possibility to FM modulate the signal must be verified. The pll filter looks accessible. A PC audio output could be injected to the filter via an attenuator.

I investigated the possibility to add a low cost audio interface to Hermes-Lite following the project goals:

• Maintain enough compatibility with Hermes to use existing Hermes SDR front-end software with no or minor modification
• Cost of less than $150 (cost includes FPGA board) for hobbyist who build their own.

     

https://github.com/ik1xpv/Hermes-Lite/tree/master  https://github.com/ik1xpv/Hermes-Lite/tree/audiocodec_1

 

https://github.com/softerhardware/Hermes-Lite

 

 

  http://www.steila.com/SDR/RFT3532/RFT3532.html