Open Source Sdr Ham Transceiver Prototype

Posted4 months agoActive4 months ago

crcastle

117 points

11 comments

m17project.orgTechstory

excitedpositive

Debate

20/100

Software Defined RadioHam RadioOpen Source Hardware

Key topics

Software Defined Radio

Ham Radio

Open Source Hardware

The M17 Project has released a prototype of an open-source SDR ham transceiver, sparking discussion about its potential, cost, and possible improvements.

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Discussion Activity

Moderate engagement

First comment

Peak period

84-96h

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3.7

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01Story posted
Sep 9, 2025 at 9:38 PM EDT
4 months ago
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02First comment
Sep 13, 2025 at 12:57 PM EDT
4d after posting
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8 comments in 84-96h
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Sep 15, 2025 at 5:33 AM EDT
4 months ago
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Discussion (11 comments)

Showing 11 comments

space_fountain

4 months ago

1 reply

Very cool, this was one of the projects I really wanted to build before I knew better. Trying to understand what was involved taught me so much. I couldn’t find what analog to digital converter and digital to analog converter this uses which would be interesting

I also think a wider bandwidth would be interesting if impractical. Something like recording everything happening on the 2 meter band would be impractical but very cool. I think

jasonjayr

4 months ago

1 reply

I have an RTL-SDR that can cover 3.2mhz -- and with sufficient storage IO could record just about the whole 2m band. I want to see if I could find or develop a SDR app that could visualize like sdrpp, or the other popular ones, but keep a 1-2 minute ring buffer of the data so I could jump back to previously spotted signals when watching a band.

Neywiny

4 months ago

1 reply

Feels like you could put a PR in on this? https://github.com/SarahRoseLives/rtl_tcp_echo

jasonjayr

4 months ago

Possibly -- I think the biggest work is more the UX of the functionality: all the controls and UI for scrubbing around the ring buffer, extending the buffer if you need to work a signal and don't want to lose data, jumping to current, etc.

willis936

4 months ago

2 replies

That cost is steep. For people willing to trade time for money I bet you could get fab and BOM for a fraction of the price from a place like OSHpark and do assembly yourself.

NoiseBert69

4 months ago

1 reply

Depends on your tariffs. In Europe JLCPCB is always an option for PCBs. But as soon you order things with components placed on them you'll go into a different tariff regime and it will be $$$ quickly.

willis936

4 months ago

Yeah duties are the silent killer for assemblies. Safest to go with "local" assembly houses that subcontract and make the true cost transparent.

While $100 a unit isn't bad, the $500 buy in is a tough pill to swallow for a solo hobbyist. This doesn't look super fun to hand assemble either though.

8bitsrule

4 months ago

Looks like a project that Adafruit Electronics would have the capacity and experience to put together a great parts kit for. Else, ouch ... power "around 5dBm"? For those of us used to thinking in watts, that's around 0.003 w. ... of UHF.

Thanks to the availability of kits (mostly Heathkit), I got my start in Ham radio (and computing). Learned a lot - and kit prices helped me to afford that.

CheeseFromLidl

4 months ago

Apart from a 70cm mention I don’t see frequency specs.

Similar project for HF (kHz to ~30MHz) is the radioberry project, a kind of spin-off from the hermes sdr.

K0balt

4 months ago

I think this would BOM/build at about $60 At JLCPCB if you did some minor optimizations for Asian supply chains and ordered >20 at a time, so I think we could see these boards eventually around a $100 price point or even less.

I would definitely buy one.

NoiseBert69

4 months ago

This thing and the new FreeDV audio codec BBFM will be a major breakthrough if they can be combined. The codec offers full 8kHz voice deep down into the noise floor without breaking the legacy channel width.

That would bring ham radio back to the top of the food chain in terms of digital radios.

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ID: 45192012Type: storyLast synced: 11/20/2025, 2:30:18 PM

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