3 ms·

The flipper isn't really a full sdr though, it just has a very minimalist RF IC that has almost non-existent bandwidth. For $400 you can get a limeSDR mini tha

The flipper isn't really a full sdr though, it just has a very minimalist RF IC that has almost non-existent bandwidth. For $400 you can get a limeSDR mini that can read and write 30MHz of spectrum at a time, ie the entire ham 70cm band all at once. If you think a flipper is dangerous, plug in a dummy load and dump noise on L1 then watch your phones GPS stop working, or alternatively decide it's on another continent.

stavros 3y ago
That's true, but more people want to do a little bit of everything than a lot of something. That's why the Flipper is popular.
- twosdai 3y ago
  And it has a fun dolphin mascot!
  - shon 3y ago
    Yeah!
- AnarchismIsCool 3y ago
  I think it's a case of good marketing and good packaging. Realistically you need a laptop to do serious field stuff with a flipper, but only if you plan on doing any testing and reconfiguration and only initially. The flipper isn't much bigger than the limesdr card, but it's nicely packaged and portable so once you have it ready to go you can throw it in a pocket. The community also helps. The flipper is wildly overpriced for being a glorified happy meal toy but millions of people squeezing every ounce of functional potential out of a happy meal toy is better than a few dozen people writing academic papers with mostly high end industrial (cellular base station) and military applications.
MuffinFlavored 3y ago
what benefit does being able to read the entire ham 70cm at once bring/what usecases does it unlock? interested in learning
- baby_souffle 3y ago
  Comes in handy when you’re hunting for a signal but don’t know where it is exactly. Think flash light with wide beam versus narrow beam.
- AnarchismIsCool 3y ago
  Depends very broadly on your area of interest, but to throw out some random numbers and thoughts: If you want to move data between two points, 30MHz of "bandwidth", depending on noise and signal, can be on the order of 30MB/s data rates or more assuming you're good at doing QAM or similar modulation. That's 50x what the CC1101 in the flipper maxes out at If you want to search for a particular signal of interest (ie why does turning on my LED lamp open my garage door), that's more spectrum you can view at once, about 3x wider than what an RTL-SDR can receive. Similarly, you can view the entirety of a 30MHz wide emission as opposed to only seeing pieces of it. You could monitor two different narrow bandwidth signal sources that are within ~30MHz of each other simultaneously, ie the 101.5FM broadcast channel and 121.5 airband guard channel. This provides the capabilities of something like a police radio scanner, covering the entire VHF or UHF land mobile band but without having to stop listening to find another signal and the ability to record the entire spectrum capture to disk so you can review all concurrent transmissions separately at a later time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterfall_plot#/media/File:SDRpp_FM_subcarriers.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterfall_plot#/media/File:SDR... Above is a spectrum plot of an FM broadcast station using wide FM modulation and with some digital sub carriers on either side for song info etc. Other stations will be to the left and right of it and the "bandwidth" of the receiver determines how wide the plot you can view is.
  - hex4def6 3y ago
    Kind of a tangent, but websdr.org is one of those sites that you can spend hours searching for interesting radio signals in waterfall plots.

stavros 3y ago

That's true, but more people want to do a little bit of everything than a lot of something. That's why the Flipper is popular.

twosdai 3y ago
And it has a fun dolphin mascot!
- shon 3y ago
  Yeah!
AnarchismIsCool 3y ago
I think it's a case of good marketing and good packaging. Realistically you need a laptop to do serious field stuff with a flipper, but only if you plan on doing any testing and reconfiguration and only initially. The flipper isn't much bigger than the limesdr card, but it's nicely packaged and portable so once you have it ready to go you can throw it in a pocket. The community also helps. The flipper is wildly overpriced for being a glorified happy meal toy but millions of people squeezing every ounce of functional potential out of a happy meal toy is better than a few dozen people writing academic papers with mostly high end industrial (cellular base station) and military applications.

MuffinFlavored 3y ago

what benefit does being able to read the entire ham 70cm at once bring/what usecases does it unlock? interested in learning

baby_souffle 3y ago
Comes in handy when you’re hunting for a signal but don’t know where it is exactly. Think flash light with wide beam versus narrow beam.
AnarchismIsCool 3y ago
Depends very broadly on your area of interest, but to throw out some random numbers and thoughts: If you want to move data between two points, 30MHz of "bandwidth", depending on noise and signal, can be on the order of 30MB/s data rates or more assuming you're good at doing QAM or similar modulation. That's 50x what the CC1101 in the flipper maxes out at If you want to search for a particular signal of interest (ie why does turning on my LED lamp open my garage door), that's more spectrum you can view at once, about 3x wider than what an RTL-SDR can receive. Similarly, you can view the entirety of a 30MHz wide emission as opposed to only seeing pieces of it. You could monitor two different narrow bandwidth signal sources that are within ~30MHz of each other simultaneously, ie the 101.5FM broadcast channel and 121.5 airband guard channel. This provides the capabilities of something like a police radio scanner, covering the entire VHF or UHF land mobile band but without having to stop listening to find another signal and the ability to record the entire spectrum capture to disk so you can review all concurrent transmissions separately at a later time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterfall_plot#/media/File:SDRpp_FM_subcarriers.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterfall_plot#/media/File:SDR... Above is a spectrum plot of an FM broadcast station using wide FM modulation and with some digital sub carriers on either side for song info etc. Other stations will be to the left and right of it and the "bandwidth" of the receiver determines how wide the plot you can view is.
- hex4def6 3y ago
  Kind of a tangent, but websdr.org is one of those sites that you can spend hours searching for interesting radio signals in waterfall plots.