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PRINCIPLES AND APPLICATIONS OF
SOFTWARE DEFINED RADIOS

COURSE OVERVIEW

This course will give participants the technical background and practical experience to understand and use software defined radios (SDRs) for communications, testing and measurement, RF system development.

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Until recently radio technology relied on hardware to perform amplification, filtering, frequency conversion, and modulation.  Starting in the mid-1990’s, with the advent of analog-digital converters and digital processors with sufficient speed, it has become possible to perform all the hardware radio functions in software.  In the last five years both the RF-to-digital hardware and software tools to perform all the radio functions have become widely available.

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Material will also cover advantages and limits of SDR technology, introduction to radio propagation and link analysis, modulation and waveforms used in digital and analog communications (AM, FM, ASK, FSK, QAM, etc…), commercial SDR software for reception and analysis (such as SDRplay, GQRX, etc…) SDR programing environments (GNU Radio, LabView, OSSIE, Python, etc…), antennas and other components to make SDRs work well.  The class will provide opportunities for “real world” reception, measurements, and analysis.

COURSE OBJECTIVES

Participants will learn:

  1. Hardware- and software- defined radio similarities and differences, advantages and limitations

  2. The characteristics and specification of commercially available SDRs

  3. How to install and perform basic SDR operations (receive an FM station)

  4. How to use transmit capable SDRs for communications, ranging, and testing applications

  5. An introduction to digital signal processing for SDR applications (techniques for amplification, signal combining, modulation, demodulation, filtering, automatic control and feedback, etc)

  6. A brief introduction to analog and digital communications, noise, and antennas.

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* To tailor the course to participants requirements, with prior coordination, participants may bring devices for analysis, characterization, and discussion.

COURSE TOPICS

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Using both presentations, simulations, and hands-on, lab-based examples, participants will:

  • Review traditional hardware and current SDR radio architectures

  • Install and operate several SDR platforms and tools sets

  • Use SDRs for reception and transmission of voice and data, and RF test and measurement tools.

  • Learn how SDRs can be used for rapid prototyping and design of RF systems

Please contact our Training Department for more information and registration details.

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