SDR Dongle setup & Pager tutorial
Posted: Mon Dec 21, 2015 10:19 am
When you get your SDR dongle, The first thing to do is download Zadig and SDRSharp.
http://airspy.com/download/
http://zadig.akeo.ie/
Put your dongle into a usb 2 port. If you change the port that the dongle is in, you will need to reinistall the driver each time.
Run Zadig, Select Options, List all Devices. Select your usb from the list and click install driver. If windows attempted to install a generic driver you might have it say to replace the driver instad.
To decode pager messages, You will need a virtual audio cable. Download VB cable
http://vb-audio.pagesperso-orange.fr/Cable/index.htm
Extract the file, right click on the installation file and choose run as administrator. Install it, once done reboot your computer. Once restarted, open your audio properties on your computer, Click on the playback tab. Select vb cable and go to properties. On the advanced tab, make sure you have it set as follows.
Cick ok then go to the recording tab and do the exact same there
Open SDRSharp. Top left corner where it asks for the source select the RTL-SDR usb
Click the little tog wheel above and set your options the same as this. The gain and ppm you will experiment with.
Tune to a known pager frequency and set your options the same as this
You should be now set to press the play button. I've adjusted my zoom, contrast and range aswell
Reopen the cog wheel from before and adjust the ppm until the red line is in the centre of the frequency on the waveform or as close to the centre as possible
Open PDW, Select interface, setup. Set your options as follows
Click ok, then options, options. Set as this.
I should note that my volume is set to 55DB in SDRSharp
The needle in pdw should be moving, Give it a few minutes for some pager messages to come through. After a bit you should be decoding at 100 percent
http://airspy.com/download/
http://zadig.akeo.ie/
Put your dongle into a usb 2 port. If you change the port that the dongle is in, you will need to reinistall the driver each time.
Run Zadig, Select Options, List all Devices. Select your usb from the list and click install driver. If windows attempted to install a generic driver you might have it say to replace the driver instad.
To decode pager messages, You will need a virtual audio cable. Download VB cable
http://vb-audio.pagesperso-orange.fr/Cable/index.htm
Extract the file, right click on the installation file and choose run as administrator. Install it, once done reboot your computer. Once restarted, open your audio properties on your computer, Click on the playback tab. Select vb cable and go to properties. On the advanced tab, make sure you have it set as follows.
Cick ok then go to the recording tab and do the exact same there
Open SDRSharp. Top left corner where it asks for the source select the RTL-SDR usb
Click the little tog wheel above and set your options the same as this. The gain and ppm you will experiment with.
Tune to a known pager frequency and set your options the same as this
You should be now set to press the play button. I've adjusted my zoom, contrast and range aswell
Reopen the cog wheel from before and adjust the ppm until the red line is in the centre of the frequency on the waveform or as close to the centre as possible
Open PDW, Select interface, setup. Set your options as follows
Click ok, then options, options. Set as this.
I should note that my volume is set to 55DB in SDRSharp
The needle in pdw should be moving, Give it a few minutes for some pager messages to come through. After a bit you should be decoding at 100 percent
