Here is the link that will get you started. https://www.sdr.hu/
But read on before you click on it, read on.
When you click on this link you will see a list of over 400 stations that are streaming what comes into their radio onto the Internet. Reception varies around the world, so if you are interested in QSO's in the USA, search on USA. If you are just curious, you can click on any of the stations listed and scan through frequencies in any mode from about 0 to 30 MgHz. Be sure to select the appropriate Mode. The software takes a little getting use to, but it is for the most part intuitive, and you can't do any harm by pushing buttons. So feel free to experiment. I have tried this on my tower, my Samsung Tablet, and even my Android phone. I got it to work on each, but clicking on tiny buttons on a phone is problematic at best. Go with a laptop, tower or tablet for best results.
This is the first thing you will see when you click on the above link.
I was mainly interested in stations in the USA so I typed USA into the search bar and came up with several choices. The station in Idaho seemed popular, so I picked it. Note, you can tell the popularity of a station by checking out the votes to the right of each station.
I thought I would try the 40 meter band so I clicked around 7 MHz. This is what the screen looked like on the CW portion of the band. Those blobs to the left are dots and dashes in CW. The control console is the grey box to the lower right. It contains all the controls you need to do just about anything you would be capable of doing if you had a radio sitting in front of you. In this case I clicked on the CW button, zoomed in with the + magnifier, and nudged the frequency up and down with the smaller circled pluses and minuses. Here is what the Idaho site looked like.
Next I decided to explore the voice part of the band. First I clicked on the LSB button, and then I moved up the band where I found a voice conversation. To move up you can either click and drag the blue section to the left, or click on the grey bar at the top further up the band. You will learn other ways to accomplish the same thing as you become familiar with the software. So play. You can't hurt anything. This is what the voice section of the band looked like.
The conversation I tuned in on was between two hams discussing loop antennas.
And, just so you know what to expect in the way of audio quality I attached a sound clip that I recorded. The discussion centered around the need for an variable tuning capacitor. The higher the transmitter power the higher the voltage. Higher voltages in turn require bigger plate spacing to prevent arcing. Along with the bigger spacing comes larger plate areas for the same capacitance. And, along with that, a higher price tag.In keeping with ham tradition, these two were lamenting the higher price tag.
Click Here to Listen to the conversation
