Thursday, Oct. 16, 2014 — I’ll have to admit it — I’m really surprised and enthusiastic about my latest ham radio acquisition — a Cross Country Wireless SDR4+.
I’m monitoring 75 meters right now with this amazing little box. I’ve been slow to join the software defined radio movement, and I wanted to dip my toe in the collective SDR waters by picking up this CCW unit.
I checked out the website during the week or so I was watching the unit on eBay … reviews were pretty good, and my youtube visits made it clear that the little unit worked well. “Worked well” is an understatement.
Installation was a breeze — install the software off the CD (drivers) and then the HDSDR software, which isn’t only easy to use, but very intuitive. The unit is powered from the USB connection to your computer (it requires two USB cables, one of which is dedicated to power). All I had to do was to connect an antenna to the connector and boom — I was on the air. Well, I was monitoring stations on the air.
Its amazingly versatile to operate too. The station I was monitoring on 75 meters had a wider signal than the stock bandwidth; so all I had to do was to grab the upper limit on the RF window and pull it to the right until the bandwidth expanded from 2.4 to 3.3 kHz.
The only thing that’s missing on the HDSDR is digital modes, though the software does include ECSS and DRM modes, as well as the usual AM, FM, USB, LSB and CW modes.
I don’t intend this to be a complete review, especially since I’m still learning, but the damn thing is simply amazing. It makes me want to get a Flex radio for the shack.
The SDR 4+ is heads and shoulders above my Yaesu FT-817 on the same antenna. There’s no comparison … in fact, you could convince me that the Yaesu needs repair or an alignment.
More to come … 73 es CUL de KY4Z … SK