[A-DX] VoA radiogram / Outernet

[Roger]

VOA Radiogram listener receives and decodes Outernet content

In July 2014, we reported about Outernet, which, according to
Google, "is a filecast service provider, providing global file
distribution over the L-band satellite stream."

VOA Radiogram listener and contributor Merkouris, SV3HWM, in
Greece, recently wrote that he "decoded for the first time the
Outernet broadcast via Inmarsat on the L-band." The content was a
science news story from VOA.

      Outernet started test broadcasts on the Ku satellite band
      but this year they moved the service on the L-band because
      the project on the higher band proved to be not commercially
      viable. A cheap RTL-SDR dongle, a LNA and a simple antenna
      are sufficient for the reception of the signals on the
      L-band.

      Initially they supported only the Raspberry and C.H.I.P.
      single-board computers but now they are testing the
      demodulating and decoding software on desktop Linux and
      Windows. On the Microsoft OS the software runs on a Linux
      VM.

      The broadcasts are modulated in a Viasat proprietary
      protocol, based on BPSK, and the signal can be demodulated
      and decoded with the software provided by Outernet. While
      the source code is not available, the software can be freely
      used.

      Now they are testing at very low speeds of 2400 bps and they
      broadcast about 10 MB per day. From what I have received so
      far, the content of the test broadcasts is mainly Wikipedia
      articles and a few news articles.

      The hardware I use for the reception is an experimental
      home-made 12-turn helical antenna, a Minikits EME179 L-band
      pre-amplifier and  an RTL-SDR v.3 dongle. I also tested the
      patch antenna and the cheaper LNA with filter available from
      the Outernet store with excellent results.

For more discussion, see the posts by SV2HWM (Merkouris) here:

https://discuss.outernet.is/t/emea-region-l-band-frequencies/2242/53

The Outernet website is:

https://outernet.is/

The satellite locations and frequencies are here:

https://outernet.is/tech

Merkouris suggests these other links:

http://store.outernet.is/
https://www.minikits.com.au/eme179.htm
http://www.rtl-sdr.com


Image: L-band antenna, amplifier, and RTL-SDR used to
receive Outernet transmissions ...

Sending Pic:224x164C;

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Wer das Bild sehen möchte: Einfach 'mal heute Abend beim VOA 
Radiogram#182  @17580 kHz   16.00-16.30z hineinschauen.....

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"...they broadcast about 10 MB per day." ....hört sich aber nicht viel 
an - oder meinen die GB?


;-)
roger