"It's DXing, Jim, but not as we know it"

Or "How to survive the sporadic E season if you have a band 2 SDR"

This is actually quite serious if you have even a vague interest in band 2 DXing and I am glad I had the foresight to create a workaround for this rather tricky situation. The world of band 2 DXing has changed .... bring on the Elad FDM-S2 band 2 SDR receiver. It opens up an exciting world of DXing potential, but it an also cause a few headaches. I knew my hobby was going to change and I needed a plan of action.

The SDR receiver opens up the whole band for DX. Literally! When you hear a DX signal on a single frequency, you might not realise just how many other DX signals may be present on other frequencies. The 6 MHz bandwidth of the FDM-S2 demonstrates this nicely. As an example, a single burst of meteor scatter would produce a signal on a particular frequency when DXing on my Sony XDR-F1HD. This is because traditional DXing involves monitoring just one frequency. But with an SDR radio like the Elad FDM-S2, you soon realise that a single meteor ping can actually produce signals on ALL frequencies in the 6 MHz range. That's a potential 60 loggings from one short 'ping', or more if you are lucky enough to receive several stations battling it out on one frequency!

On the face of it, this all sounds like great fun, and it really is. I now anticipate a greater number of DX catches when the band is open for DX - and hopefully something exotic along the way which I may have otherwise missed with single frequency DXing. There is a downside to this. Some people I have spoken to didn't realise how much extra work this is going to create, especially as we move deeper into the sporadic E season. Trust me when I say this, the SDR can create a lot of extra work if you record the DX to play back later at a more convenient time. In fact, it can actually be stressful over time, as a few DXers have noticed. This is the point where the radio controls YOU, rather than the opposite way around. There is an urgent need to develop a strict procedure for DXing and for general time management. Failure to do this could have serious consequences!

What I am experiencing could destroy your radio hobby for ever. Within a week or two of the 2015 sporadic E season, I had heard from two other DXers for whom their FM SDR receiver has changed their lives. I too have had to rethink the hobby after slaving over hundreds of my own SDR recordings over the last few days. It's just TOO MUCH!

I remember the first Italian sporadic E opening this season on band 2. I recorded the event, all ten minutes or so of it! Note, just TEN minutes. This was an intermittent opening and listed approximately 20 minutes. Signals were present for ten minutes of that time. During the opening, I was DXing live but only identified two stations. It wasn't until I played back the recordings later that day that I realised the enormity of the issue. It was really exciting to play back the event at a more convenient time and be able to work out exactly which area of Italy was propagating. I studied the ten minutes worth of recordings very carefully indeed. It was quite remarkable. After four hours checking those recordings, my measly two loggings shot up to FIFTY SIX!!! Yes, I did say FOUR HOURS. That is just WAY too much!

So what would happen if there was a big Es opening to Italy? Or to Spain? Or both countries together? What if that opening lasted several hours? Well, this is happening right now as I type! But look ... I am not DXing. I am not even recording the DX! It's all become too much! I have already accumulated hundreds of recordings and I am wondering when I am going to find the time to play them back. My enthusiasm is actually waning. Plus I certainly don't have the hard drive space for anything more than ten hours of recordings. But would I really need to record an entire DX opening? How much space I am going to need for a whole season's worth? Do I even need to record all of it?

There is no doubt that there is a lot to think about if you are going to invest in an SDR for band 2 DXing. Workarounds are going to be needed, but there are several possibilities. I am practicing one of them as I type. There is a big sporadic E event to Italy and Spain right now (this article is being written, bit by bit, over several weeks). Throw in a few Balkan countries too and then consider that this opening has been in progress for six or seven hours today. In fact this opening ran well into the evening too. As I have already stated, I am not DXing and I am not actually recording anything at this moment. I am aiming to grab 20 to 30 seconds worth of recording for each third of the band. This will give me a snapshot of the conditions, but that should be enough time to get a good idea of what is happening on the band. I can check through the recordings at some future time and compile log when I do. If conditions don't seem to be changing then there is no real need to record a quick snapshot after a few minutes. I could wait for the conditions to move around and then take more 'snapshot recordings'.

I needed a structure which is agreeable on different levels, i.e. my wife, domestic life, work, etc., because, suddenly, the DX world has changed and it's going to take up a lot more of my time. The snapshot system I described above works well. Even a relatively brief opening can produce a couple of hundred loggings. I can take my time and choose when to play them back and compile my logs. It's not ideal, but the FDM-S2 has opened up a world of new DX possibilities. Some would say there is plenty of 'quantity', but where is the 'quality'? Well, judge for yourselves if you look through my logs. I can only log what is there. But the fact is that I have already logged the Canary Islands, the Azores and Turkey. The chances are that I would have missed most of these with single-frequency DXing.

Let's be honest, there's nothing to beat live DXing. There's the thrill of being there while the event is in progress. It's live. It's real. You can't beat that excitement. But technology is very clever now - you can potentially discover so much more if you record the event for future playback. Just make sure you have enough hard drive space.

There is also a point I'd like to stress. If you are an SDR owner and plan to record all your DX, please consider entering at least a couple of loggings into the FM List website, should you normally use it. This helps other's see the DX path and acts as an alert. I always think that DXing to yourself is slightly selfish (but there's nothing particularly wrong with this). Just consider helping other DXers in this way.

To recap.:
If the band is solid with DX and you don't want to miss it, just take a simple 30 second snapshot of each 6 MHz block of the band. Do this every five or ten minutes or so, or as conditions change. If you are receiving the same stations ten minutes later, it might not be necessary to make more snapshot recordings, although something new will probably op up if you do! Of course, DO make recordings if something interesting suddenly appears. It's precisely these moments you've been saving your hard drive space for.

It's surprising - playing back 30 seconds of 60 channels of DX can bag you dozens of loggings, but it can take many minutes to do this, but it's much quicker than going through dozens of back-to-back recordings of the same opening. True enough, if you have the will and the time to examine countless files with a fine tooth comb, then you will probably pick up a few additional catches and maybe one or two rarities.

DO invest in a couple of terabytes of hard drive space if you can. You never know when you'll need it. A 1 TB hard drive will afford you around seven or eight hours of 6 MHz IF bandwidth recordings. Maybe you don't have time to play back all those recordings, in which case you can check the historical data on DX clusters to see if conditions were good on a certain date, at a certain time, or while you were away from the receiver, so you'll know if and when to check the recordings.

For DXers with unlimited time and hard drive space: If you genuinely have the will to spend the rest of your days trawling through endless recordings of your DX, then you don't have a problem. Be warned though, this could send you insane (if you aren't already).

It's like the Cadbury's Creme Egg scenario. "How do you eat yours?". We all have our own ways of doing things. As long as you enjoy the hobby then it's all well and good. But DXers taking on SDRs for the first time should be aware that it is potentially life-changing. I have known DXers who spent so much time on their radios over the years that relationship break-ups and divorces resulted. It's an addictive hobby and needs to be managed sensibly. While I am not considering myself to be the most sensible and considerate person on the planet (I spend far too much time DXing) I thought a few words on this subject might be worth putting to print. As for my own marriage, I am not in the doghouse just yet, but I need to go into the other room every now and again to remind my wife what I look like. ;O)

Happy SDR DXing!