HamRadio
Using GNU Radio for Amateur Radio
Ham radio operators are given a license by their government enabling them to make radio transmissions for the purpose of scientific investigation, experimentation and non-commercial communication. Ham radio provides great opportunities for learning, education, disaster relief and making interesting discoveries.
Ham licenses typically offer access to frequencies in every significant portion of the radio spectrum, including HF bands (between 1MHz and 30MHz), VHF (144MHz - 148MHz), UHF (420MHz - 450MHz) and many microwave bands. The license authorizes many different transmission modes (FM voice, SSB, digital, TV) and significant power levels (over 1kW in some countries).
To get started, you may need to search for the organization responsible for amateur radio in your country. They may be able to advise you if you need to complete an exam to qualify for a license or if your existing qualification, such as an electrical engineering degree, automatically qualifies you for a license. A starting point may be the International Amateur Radio Union or Wikipedia
Getting started
If you've never touched GNU Radio before, these pages will get you started with a running installation of GNU Radio and will show you how to take your first steps with this software radio tool.
- What is GNU Radio and why do I want it? - Read this if you really have no idea what this project is about.
- Installing GNU Radio - This will explain all the steps to get a working installation of GNU Radio.
- Tutorials - Several tutorials for varying skill levels.
- The Comprehensive GNU Radio Archive Network (CGRAN) - A list of 3rd party GNU Radio apps
- Frequently Asked Questions - Check this page before asking questions on the mailing list.
Hardware components for HF
Hardware is not part of GNU Radio, which is purely a software library. However, developing radio and signal processing code is even more fun when using hardware to actually transmit and receive, and GNU Radio supports several radio front-ends, either natively or through additional out-of-tree modules.
For a list of supported devices, see our Hardware page.
Additional items for HF use (below 70MHz) will be listed here (TBD).
GNU Radio Amateur Radio monthly meeting group
- The agenda and notes about the on-line video meetings can be seen on Talk:HamRadio.
- The Ham Radio chat room on Matrix is available for follow-up and continuing discussion.
- server: https://chat.gnuradio.org
- room: #HamRadio:gnuradio.org