SDR Television Beta #1
Simon Brown • April 21, 2025
Post Date: April 21st, 2025
Updated: April 23rd, 2025 with new download links for SDR Television (scroll down)
Overview
This is the first publicly available kit for a project I've been working on for roughly 18 months. SDR Television is a DVB-S2 / AAC / H264 / H265 program for use on the QO-100 satellite. It uses many DLLs from SDR Console, mainly to control a Pluto / LibreSDR.
Why?
Why not? This is an area of software I had not previously encountered, so a huge learning curve, not only the programming but also building a DATV station for QO-100 (more about that later).
Proof of Concept
This first release, v1.0 is a proof of concept, showing that it's possible to develop a full-duplex DATV solution on a modern x86 computer. If there is enough interest, future kits will extend the features by adding H266 / AV1 / Opus and a better cross-band user interface. For now, the project is focused on QO-100.
Host Requirements
- Windows 11 is recommended. Windows 10 is also supported.
- 64-bit architecture.
- Ideally 8 cores or more but has been used at 333ksps with an i5-7200u.
- AVX2 (so no Core2Duo support).
- Use with emulators such as Prism and Parallels is initially disabled, possibly available later in 2025.
User Guide
If you just want to read the guide (PDF) then click here to download. Reading the user guide is highly recommended!
Support
For now, please use the SDR-Radio.com mailing list. This is a traditional mailing list.
Crash Dumps
If you experience a crash, please save the file and either
- upload to the cloud - OneDrive, Dropbox etc., or
- use WeTransfer.
Then send a link to mailto:simon@sdr-radio.com.
Pluto & LibreSDR
You must create new definitions as the previous are now not supported.
Kits
- All code-signed, there's nothing to worry about.
- You must install the SDR Radio kit as it now supports wideband mode which is required for Pluto. Even if you will not be using a Pluto (or similar) this kit must be installed.
- After installing the SDR Radio kit, install the SDR Television kit in the same folder.
Downloads
These kits were created on April 21st, 2025. You must install both kits.
SDR Radio v3.4 build 3677 (April 21st, 2025)
SDR Television v1.0 build 727, (April 23rd, 2025)
SDR Television v1.1.2 June 12th, 2026: Add option to disable audio, thus making more bits available for video, this is for use in DATV contests. Note: 66 ksps sample rate is still experimental, will be improved. Downloads are at the bottom of this page.
SDR Television v1.1.1 June 9th, 2026: Fixes a fatal bug in the Settings, Camera page. Downloads are at the bottom of this page.
Version 1.6.2 This release fixes two bugs in the new DX Spot feature. The spot age logic incorrectly affected spot display. When the map was zoomed, station markers off the map would be displayed at the top left (0, 0). Downloads are on the World Map page . Version 1.6.1 This release fixes two fatal bugs in the new DX Spot feature. When the graphics engine is restarted, resources are correctly released. Fixed a resource leak when processing the MoseMove logic. Downloads are on the World Map page . Version 1.6 This release adds the display of DX Spots. Display spots are submitted to PSK Reporter which in turn are relayed by a MQTT Broker running on a high performance Akamia node. Spot Format Each spot consists of these fields: Sequence Frequency Band Mode Signal level Time stamp Sending station call, square, country Receiving station call, square, country Note: The country is the ADIF country. Spots are displayed as they arrive, currently no on-demand database. Bandwidth To reduce bandwidth from the broker, filtering is required for 80m up to and including 15m. Filtering requires at least one field below to be set in a definition: Receiver callsign, square or country. Sender callsign, square or country. Without filtering the bandwith from the broker could be excessive. For LF and VHF+ no filtering is required due to the lower number of spots sent on these bands. In a later version the bandwidth restriction may be reduced.
Version 1.6.1 This release fixes two fatal bugs in the new DX Spot feature. When the graphics engine is restarted, resources are correctly released. Fixed a resource leak when processing the MoseMove logic. Downloads are on the World Map page . Version 1.6 This release adds the display of DX Spots. Display spots are submitted to PSK Reporter which in turn are relayed by a MQTT Broker running on a high performance Akamia node. Spot Format Each spot consists of these fields: Sequence Frequency Band Mode Signal level Time stamp Sending station call, square, country Receiving station call, square, country Note: The country is the ADIF country. Spots are displayed as they arrive, currently no on-demand database. Bandwidth To reduce bandwidth from the broker, filtering is required for 80m up to and including 15m. Filtering requires at least one field below to be set in a definition: Receiver callsign, square or country. Sender callsign, square or country. Without filtering the bandwith from the broker could be excessive. For LF and VHF+ no filtering is required due to the lower number of spots sent on these bands. In a later version the bandwidth restriction may be reduced.
Version 1.6 This release adds the display of DX Spots. Display spots are submitted to PSK Reporter which in turn are relayed by a MQTT Broker running on a high performance Akamia node. Spot Format Each spot consists of these fields: Sequence Frequency Band Mode Signal level Time stamp Sending station call, square, country Receiving station call, square, country Note: The country is the ADIF country. Spots are displayed as they arrive, currently no on-demand database. Bandwidth To reduce bandwidth from the broker, filtering is required for 80m up to and including 15m. Filtering requires at least one field below to be set in a definition: Receiver callsign, square or country. Sender callsign, square or country. Without filtering the bandwith from the broker could be excessive. For LF and VHF+ no filtering is required due to the lower number of spots sent on these bands. In a later version the bandwidth restriction may be reduced.
SDR Television v1.1 May 18th, 2026: This is the official v1.1 release , code exactly the same as 1.0.16 which has survived testing for a few weeks. Lots of improvements since the last official kit. As with any software project, there's always room for improvements and new features, but for now here's a stable solution which works well with the QO-100 satellite. Many thanks to Sigi and the DATV test team. Downloads are at the bottom of this page.
SDR Television v1.0.14 April 12th, 2026: A new kit, lots of improvements since the last official kit. As with any software project, there's always room for improvements and new features, but for now here's a stable solution which works well with the QO-100 satellite. Many thanks to Sigi and the DATV test team. Downloads are at the bottom of this page.
SDR Television v1.0.9 March 13th, 2026: A new kit, lots of receive improvements since the last official kit. As with any software project, there's always room for improvements and new features, but for now here's a stable solution which works well with the QO-100 satellite. Many thanks to the DATV test team. Downloads are at the bottom of this page.
First Impressions
