Despite my humorous comment many thanks for creating the comparison, it is well presented , because seeing them side by side with the same signals on the receiver you can even see what is going on at the signals you are currently not demodulating - just looking at the waterfalls. It seems the RSP1A has a very good price, having fixed the main points of users criticism that RSP1 has - eg. poor frequency stability and plenty of intermod on 160m band when connected to a serious antenna. The selective band attenuation/blocking (AM - FM - DAB) is very effective, which you can see in the overall waterfall spectrum as well and if you look at the price of these filters if you buy them separately, this an impressive deal. I noticed the noise level on the same radio at the same frequency changed from around -143dBm to -135dBm ... more astonishing is that the visible signal to noise changes from around 30dB to 22dB at the weak signal from KHAN airports ASOS in Athens,GA at 132.875 as well. Compare the signals at timing 5:40 and 9:36 ... this renders the entire comparison very questionable! I am not saying you did that intentionally, it just may happen having a poor connector or cable or non symmetrical signal splitter in case you switched terminals around ... it is just strange that it changes when you left the radio on the left side of the video (RSP1A) untouched, but I guess changing the wiring for the right radio you may have moved the entire cabling, causing this to happen, degrading the reception of the RSP1A, making the RSP2 look better. The ASOS audio signal on the RSP2 sounded less noisy on the higher audio frequencies but it had a low frequent hum that may be caused by a problem with the oscillator ... would be interesting to see if this AM-hum continues on other weak signals or if this was just a coincidental interference with a very weak internal birdie? In this regard the very first RX of the RSP1A at 5:40 was probably even better than the one of the RSP2, which would prove the RSP1A over or the humming RSP2. And some general comment ... please don't focus on demodulating signals with a good signal to noise, you can receive these with an 8-bit RTL-SDR for 7$ just fine, or a germanium diode stuck in your ear :-) - the big quality difference on a good receiver is with weak signals or ideally weak signals in between very strong signals - that is the true challenge.
Which one generates the fewest phantom signals on HF? I've almost given up on my RSP2 because of the HF broadcast radio stations (AIR, CRI, Radio Romania, etc.) on 160, 80m and other frequencies they are not broadcasting on! Also, please show some dynamic tuning so we can see the aliasing signals moving in the opposite direction to the real signals. I'm only using mine with a Wellbrook look out in the countryside with no local stations.
Thank you for the excellent comparison.. great review very helpful !! I was juggling between the RSP1A and RSP2 as far as RX quality/spec.. not much between them really so it's RSP2 for me as it has the additional antenna inputs and IF in/out for my HF rig.. cheers!
Awesome review. I now have both of these receiver and would like to do similar side by side testing. How did you get the two SDR displays side by side? Also, what did you use for an antenna splitter? Thanks
hamrad88 You can run an instance of SDRuno for each RSP. The splitter was simply a wideband cable TV splitter. You do get some insertion loss, but it appears to be minimal.
On the single SMA Antenna RSP1a do you have to switch between your HF longwire antenna and VHF/UHF antenna? Or if is it best to buy the RSP2 to avoid having to switch antennas as we monitor different bands?
Louie C Depends on the antenna on the RSP1A. Some HF antennas will work ok for HF and VHF/UHF, but with some signal loss in the higher bands. Ideally it’s best to have an HF antenna as well as a dedicated VHF / UHF antenna. In that case the RSP2 or the RSPDuo would be the better choice for managing two antennas.
Awesome product comparison especially helps sdr newbies like me. I've started sdr last year. I really got interested in NOAA 15, 18, and Russia Meteor M2 on 137MHz. I'm currently using the $12 rtl-sdr dongle. I think it's time for me to go to the next level :) I want to start building a setup for capturing full disc images of earth from geostationary GOES satellites. I've narrowed the device I'm looking for between Airspy Mini/R2 and SDRPlay RSP1/RSP1A. Which one would you highly recommend? Amazing video! Thank you much! I also subscribed to your channel! :)
I regretted i sold my RSP1 again my RSP1 and replaced it with RSP2. Newer RSP is very sensitive to AM broadcast and that eliminates HAM signals along the entire band. For the owners of RSP1 the 1st version, stick to it if you want the ability to turn OFF the LNA and leave the AGC work when listening to HAM bands. With RSP2 you dont have the option to toggle the LNA OFF, its LNA is hard coded to the IF AGC, that you will not have the freedom to turn it off separately. If youre thinking to adjusting the RF gain slider with newer RSP just to filter the interference, this will filter both AM and ham signals. I live in the city with both strong AM and FM interference present and for me the LNA switch is a must. With it, you dont need to add extra line filters to your receiver. Hope SDRplay adds this switch to SDRUNO when using newer RSP. Just my 2 cents to RSP1 owners. now am lookin for RSP1 again. :(
It's unfortunate this company was than willing to help me figure out why their SDRuno software wouldn't install on my computer. I was all ready to buy the unit, but because of their unwillingness to provide any assistance, I will not buy it now.
