LWN usually has great content but they've missed out on so much free ham software in this article that I use regularly. My main HF rig is an older Yaesu FT-950

LWN usually has great content but they've missed out on so much free ham software in this article that I use regularly. My main HF rig is an older Yaesu FT-950. I tapped the IF and brought it out of the chassis where it is plugged into a cheap RTLSDR. I then access that RTLSDR (with free drivers) with GQRX (free software for visualizing anything compatible with SoapySDR or GNU radio), and the result is that I get a panadapter that is arguably better than what's available on $2000 radios. Short video here: https://photos.app.goo.gl/uP9zMMbiiiSmHYvM8 https://photos.app.goo.gl/uP9zMMbiiiSmHYvM8 As for VHF/UHF stuff, I would be hopeless if it wasn't for GPredict on my laptop making it simple to track LEO satellites. https://github.com/csete/gpredict https://github.com/csete/gpredict Short video here: https://photos.app.goo.gl/eg87BWpt2XnJdGFp7 https://photos.app.goo.gl/eg87BWpt2XnJdGFp7 I also run an APRS igate, which is powered by direwolf: https://sielicki.github.io/posts/radio-scanner-aprs-igate/ https://sielicki.github.io/posts/radio-scanner-aprs-igate/ , https://github.com/wb2osz/direwolf https://github.com/wb2osz/direwolf