I went the dedicated route to re-use a laptop. Core I5 with 4 GB of RAM, works very well except for some visual noise in the spectrum thanks to the noisy power supply, but it's only certain bands and easy to ignore. This is portable, but even more portable is using a large tablet that my wife was done with. Using Android driver and SDR touch; I found a small briefcase that it all fits in. Great for travel and where I'm not going to get too fancy.
Excellent video. My subscribers are very interested in your products and I try to sent them to your videos to as your videos are much more detailed than mine. I myself am really enjoying the RSP1A that you sent me. I am trying to decided whether to get the DUO to test the new Scan function. If you have not watched my recent shows, check out the things I am trying to do with the new Scan function and please leave comments. Lastly, I want to thank the support team with their help getting the Scan function working properly. Tom Stiles
That was quite useful. I am in the process of spec'ing a shack computer. I want to run SDRUno with an RSP2Pro both in the shack and portable. On this computer, I want to run logging software and fldigi, at the least. You've given me some good ideas for how to go about this. Thank you.
I had asked this very question on another forum and never got a response so I'm glad to see this video. In my post on the other site, I asked what is the minimum computer to run SDRuno "well". I guess you answered that in a way here but in a generic way. To summarize, I want to get the full use of my RSP2 and enjoy it without frustration. The best software to run for the RSP2 is SDRuno. I've tried them all and this (IMHO) gives the best experience. Yes, you can run cubic sdr on other platforms such as a Raspberry Pi (tried it) and it's got a coolness factor no doubt, but you need active cooling on the processor or after a bit it gets hot and throttles. Heat syncs arent enough. The performance of this setup is poor also when you put it in the context of the choices available as well. I'm a Mac guy and I've tried running SDRuno using Parallels and it does launch and work, but barely. If I try and do ANYTHING on the mac, even moving a window, it stutters and lags. It's a frustrating situation and makes it hard to enjoy the experience. So, that all said, I'm in the position now of having to look for a PC to dedicate to just running SDRuno which is why I posted the question about a minimum spec PC to run SDRuno without any performance hits. After watching this video I'm still not sure I have a clear answer. In your custom portable solution you use a NUC and that's attractive to me from a size and cost standpoint but I've read that NUCs struggle with things that are video/processors intensive (like SDRuno). Also, the cost for a high performance NUC is getting up there for a single purpose device. I wished you guys would come out with a port for Mac but I understand that would be a huge undertaking. On the plus side, you could sell it for 10 bucks or so and people would buy it as a no brainer.
Blue Planet Photo Studio anything core i3 or i5 should allow you to get the full 10MHz out if the RSP. I picked up a refurb i5 HP laptop with SSD for about $300 at Microcenter which runs just about anything I throw at it. On my mid 2011 Mac Mini I can get 4MHz with Uno running in a VM with 2 cores assigned.
Finally! I've been waiting for a video like this :) I'm doing all my homework, and looking to set myself up in SDR. RSP2 and my 10 year old Asus i7 laptop. I was very happy to see the new scanner feature for SDR Uno, as I am a scanner enthusiast. I'm curious though....it was my intention to run Linux, Debian distro, to save CPU usage and for smooth operation. You mentioned Raspberry pi (which I do plan on doing some time in the future), but what about other OS like Ubuntu or various Linux distro. It seems to be the obvious answer to me, given the resource hungry appetite of Windows machines.
Aron Douglas In Linux you’re more restricted in the software available, but you should be able to run an RSP up to 10MHz with no problem using CubicSDR. On my mid 2011 Mac Mini CubicSDR at 10MHz is easy, whereas SDRuno in a VM maxes out around 4MHz.
Good advice on the ability of hardware to accommodate the FM broadcast band. I have an older I-5 3.5 Ghz system I built with 16 gigs of RAM and an SSD C drive and it has no issues listening to FM broadcast at 10 Mhz with SDR Uno with Windows 10. I have an AMD 3.9 Ghz APU system running Windows 10 with 16 gigs of RAM also with an SSD and it can't get beyond 3 Mhz of bandwidth when listening to the FM band. It literally pumps and dumps the signals past 3 Mhz. I agree that a minimum of an I-5 CPU would be best overall for a good SDR system. The built in graphics handles the display output perfectly. The older AMD chokes at 3 Mhz. Don't know how their new APU's would handle SDR UNO though.
I just purchased a refurbished Lenovo slimline desktop that I am going to use in my hamshack. For $319 on amazon I managed to find a I-7 processor with 16GB RAM and a 480GB SSD. Plan on using it with my RSP-2 and CAT control for my HF Radios and Ham Radio Deluxe. I have already been using a 23 inch flat screen with a slower laptop and felt the time was right to upgrade to something a little bit more capable. I tried using a I-3 powered laptop with Windows 10 and 4 Gb RAM, but it was using way too much processor power to push 10mhz bandwidth without getting very choppy. Here is a link to amazon for anyone interested in the specs. www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07HCN2RHM/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
@@workingtheworld68 the Lenovo has been rock solid. I did upgrade later on to a better video card solution since I am running ham radios via computer control and running multiple programs at once. So far this computer has exceeded my expectations.
Running a I7 Core, 16gb ram, 1Tb Ssd, Nvidia 2gb. SDRUNO is terrible. Takes a while to load, windows are painting slowly, if i move them, buttons become transparent. Only show up when i click them. I need to turn off Sdruno every 15 mins, because it freezes if i do a lot of dx-ing. I found that Sdr Console (64bit) works best. When will you have a 64bit version as well?
This answers some questions about the low end of things. But if I want to get the max out of SDRuno, what are the recommended specs to run at 10 mhz sample rate with the full bandwidth of the RSP1A?
I think I was able to glean enough information to determine if my laptop (Ryzen 3 3350U 8GB RAM) will run a RSP1B but the problem here is just saying i5 without saying which generation really doesn't mean much because a 4th generation i5 and a tenth generation i5 are two completely different beasts and currently we are on 14th generation. From the video's date I can assume you mean at best 8th generation i5 (9th generation released about the time of this video) I just hope I'm not disappointed that a can't run at least 6 MHz bandwidth and have to buy another computer or laptop to make it work. I can probably get more out of less if I completely dedicate it to SDR only since I can go in and cull out all the unnecessary background processes (It already has most of the Windows Phone Home nonsense culled out)
Short answer is you'll probably have no problems. Longer answer is you've hit the nail on the head, a lot of it depends on whether you're running other CPU intensive processes. Your Ryzen 3 is roughly equivalent to an Intel i3 (which generation, who knows?) .Many people find this setup more than adequate, the reason we say i5 is simply to give us a bit more overhead, as you can see in the video even an ATOM core is capable of running the program. In testing it seems that the biggest windows-induced load comes after start up when Windows update is doing it's thing and other processes are running. Leaving it for an hour or so usual lets things settle down (the CPU gauge is a good indicator of this, it's not unusual to see it near 100% after a restart but will go way down over time). Another thing to note is even if the CPU load is low and you hear audio stuttering that usually indicates a lack of USB bandwidth, usually resulting from other devices utilizing a lot the available bandwidth, the RSP is greedy at 10MHz sample rate, requiring almost all the bandwidth of the USB host controller.
sweet, that does it, I will turn the laptop into a ham shack rig, high end HP i7 12 gb ram and a 500 gb SSD should run anything I want to toss at it, I can store all my notes and pages of scan Ch. ... back up files and control programs for my icom 706MIIG
I went the dedicated route to re-use a laptop. Core I5 with 4 GB of RAM, works very well except for some visual noise in the spectrum thanks to the noisy power supply, but it's only certain bands and easy to ignore. This is portable, but even more portable is using a large tablet that my wife was done with. Using Android driver and SDR touch; I found a small briefcase that it all fits in. Great for travel and where I'm not going to get too fancy.
Excellent video. My subscribers are very interested in your products and I try to sent them to your videos to as your videos are much more detailed than mine. I myself am really enjoying the RSP1A that you sent me. I am trying to decided whether to get the DUO to test the new Scan function. If you have not watched my recent shows, check out the things I am trying to do with the new Scan function and please leave comments. Lastly, I want to thank the support team with their help getting the Scan function working properly.
Tom Stiles
Top notch advice for me and other novice users out there.
That was quite useful. I am in the process of spec'ing a shack computer. I want to run SDRUno with an RSP2Pro both in the shack and portable. On this computer, I want to run logging software and fldigi, at the least. You've given me some good ideas for how to go about this. Thank you.
I had asked this very question on another forum and never got a response so I'm glad to see this video.
In my post on the other site, I asked what is the minimum computer to run SDRuno "well". I guess you answered that in a way here but in a generic way.
To summarize, I want to get the full use of my RSP2 and enjoy it without frustration. The best software to run for the RSP2 is SDRuno. I've tried them all and this (IMHO) gives the best experience. Yes, you can run cubic sdr on other platforms such as a Raspberry Pi (tried it) and it's got a coolness factor no doubt, but you need active cooling on the processor or after a bit it gets hot and throttles. Heat syncs arent enough. The performance of this setup is poor also when you put it in the context of the choices available as well.
I'm a Mac guy and I've tried running SDRuno using Parallels and it does launch and work, but barely. If I try and do ANYTHING on the mac, even moving a window, it stutters and lags. It's a frustrating situation and makes it hard to enjoy the experience. So, that all said, I'm in the position now of having to look for a PC to dedicate to just running SDRuno which is why I posted the question about a minimum spec PC to run SDRuno without any performance hits. After watching this video I'm still not sure I have a clear answer.
In your custom portable solution you use a NUC and that's attractive to me from a size and cost standpoint but I've read that NUCs struggle with things that are video/processors intensive (like SDRuno). Also, the cost for a high performance NUC is getting up there for a single purpose device. I wished you guys would come out with a port for Mac but I understand that would be a huge undertaking. On the plus side, you could sell it for 10 bucks or so and people would buy it as a no brainer.
Blue Planet Photo Studio anything core i3 or i5 should allow you to get the full 10MHz out if the RSP. I picked up a refurb i5 HP laptop with SSD for about $300 at Microcenter which runs just about anything I throw at it.
On my mid 2011 Mac Mini I can get 4MHz with Uno running in a VM with 2 cores assigned.
Finally! I've been waiting for a video like this :)
I'm doing all my homework, and looking to set myself up in SDR. RSP2 and my 10 year old Asus i7 laptop. I was very happy to see the new scanner feature for SDR Uno, as I am a scanner enthusiast.
I'm curious though....it was my intention to run Linux, Debian distro, to save CPU usage and for smooth operation. You mentioned Raspberry pi (which I do plan on doing some time in the future), but what about other OS like Ubuntu or various Linux distro. It seems to be the obvious answer to me, given the resource hungry appetite of Windows machines.
Aron Douglas In Linux you’re more restricted in the software available, but you should be able to run an RSP up to 10MHz with no problem using CubicSDR. On my mid 2011 Mac Mini CubicSDR at 10MHz is easy, whereas SDRuno in a VM maxes out around 4MHz.
Aron Douglas I might add your i7 should have no problem running SDRuno in Windows, as well as various other ham-related software.
@@SDRplayRSP Good to know. Guess I'll give both windows and Linux a shot. I love messing around with hardware/software in radio :)
Good advice on the ability of hardware to accommodate the FM broadcast band.
I have an older I-5 3.5 Ghz system I built with 16 gigs of RAM and an SSD C drive and it has no issues listening to FM broadcast at 10 Mhz with SDR Uno with Windows 10.
I have an AMD 3.9 Ghz APU system running Windows 10 with 16 gigs of RAM also with an SSD and it can't get beyond 3 Mhz of bandwidth when listening to the FM band. It literally pumps and dumps the signals past 3 Mhz.
I agree that a minimum of an I-5 CPU would be best overall for a good SDR system. The built in graphics handles the display output perfectly. The older AMD chokes at 3 Mhz. Don't know how their new APU's would handle SDR UNO though.
I just purchased a refurbished Lenovo slimline desktop that I am going to use in my hamshack. For $319 on amazon I managed to find a I-7 processor with 16GB RAM and a 480GB SSD. Plan on using it with my RSP-2 and CAT control for my HF Radios and Ham Radio Deluxe. I have already been using a 23 inch flat screen with a slower laptop and felt the time was right to upgrade to something a little bit more capable. I tried using a I-3 powered laptop with Windows 10 and 4 Gb RAM, but it was using way too much processor power to push 10mhz bandwidth without getting very choppy. Here is a link to amazon for anyone interested in the specs. www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07HCN2RHM/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
It's two years on, how did that refurb AMZN laptop work out for you? In general and for SDRuno
@@workingtheworld68 the Lenovo has been rock solid. I did upgrade later on to a better video card solution since I am running ham radios via computer control and running multiple programs at once. So far this computer has exceeded my expectations.
Running a I7 Core, 16gb ram, 1Tb Ssd, Nvidia 2gb. SDRUNO is terrible. Takes a while to load, windows are painting slowly, if i move them, buttons become transparent. Only show up when i click them. I need to turn off Sdruno every 15 mins, because it freezes if i do a lot of dx-ing. I found that Sdr Console (64bit) works best. When will you have a 64bit version as well?
This answers some questions about the low end of things. But if I want to get the max out of SDRuno, what are the recommended specs to run at 10 mhz sample rate with the full bandwidth of the RSP1A?
Dennis Schultz at 1:03, second slide
@@SDRplayRSP I have a core i5 with 4G of ram and I am having issues running SDRUNO by itself at the lif setting.
You should have no issues, especially with low IF. I would suspect other USB traffic, windows update etc. Look at Task Manager.
Thanks for the info . Has yourself or anyone you know used a amazon 4K fire stick with a OTG cable to connect a SDR? I’m very curious to know.
Great video*****
I think I was able to glean enough information to determine if my laptop (Ryzen 3 3350U 8GB RAM) will run a RSP1B but the problem here is just saying i5 without saying which generation really doesn't mean much because a 4th generation i5 and a tenth generation i5 are two completely different beasts and currently we are on 14th generation. From the video's date I can assume you mean at best 8th generation i5 (9th generation released about the time of this video) I just hope I'm not disappointed that a can't run at least 6 MHz bandwidth and have to buy another computer or laptop to make it work. I can probably get more out of less if I completely dedicate it to SDR only since I can go in and cull out all the unnecessary background processes (It already has most of the Windows Phone Home nonsense culled out)
Short answer is you'll probably have no problems. Longer answer is you've hit the nail on the head, a lot of it depends on whether you're running other CPU intensive processes. Your Ryzen 3 is roughly equivalent to an Intel i3 (which generation, who knows?) .Many people find this setup more than adequate, the reason we say i5 is simply to give us a bit more overhead, as you can see in the video even an ATOM core is capable of running the program. In testing it seems that the biggest windows-induced load comes after start up when Windows update is doing it's thing and other processes are running. Leaving it for an hour or so usual lets things settle down (the CPU gauge is a good indicator of this, it's not unusual to see it near 100% after a restart but will go way down over time). Another thing to note is even if the CPU load is low and you hear audio stuttering that usually indicates a lack of USB bandwidth, usually resulting from other devices utilizing a lot the available bandwidth, the RSP is greedy at 10MHz sample rate, requiring almost all the bandwidth of the USB host controller.
My PC have more then enough Ram, Eight Gigs and running Window 11, I also have the SDR Play DX Receiver,
sweet, that does it, I will turn the laptop into a ham shack rig, high end HP i7 12 gb ram and a 500 gb SSD should run anything I want to toss at it, I can store all my notes and pages of scan Ch. ... back up files and control programs for my icom 706MIIG
Raspberry pi 2 b - never any problems
Intel atom z3795 , ram 4gb.
Max 2 mhz