Raspberry PI Standalone Wireless SDR Server

In this video, I turn a Soapy Remote SDR (software defined radio) server on a Raspberry Pi 4 with an RTL-SDR Blog V3 USB dongle into a standalone wifi access point so you can access remote SDR without an internet connection.

Raspberry PI Remote SDR Server with Soapy Remote: https://youtu.be/DJnRDu2_amU

CanaKit Raspberry Pi 4 (4GB) Starter Kit (Amazon Affiliate)
US: https://amzn.to/3azJgrW
UK: https://amzn.to/2JdMq9o
CA: https://amzn.to/3bwiRvY
ES: https://amzn.to/2T06LnM (similar)
FR: https://amzn.to/3cvIZrs (similaire)
IT: https://amzn.to/2Ar74Sj (simile)
DE: https://amzn.to/2AqfWHQ (ähnlich)
IN: https://amzn.to/3ey6fWj
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NL: https://amzn.to/3f5NdsD (vergelijkbaar)

RTL-SDR Blog V3 R820T2 (Amazon Affiliate)
US: https://amzn.to/2z4hpDu
CA: https://amzn.to/3e3Ln8K (dongle only)
UK: https://amzn.to/2AuUdin
IN: https://amzn.to/2ZNJHez
AU: https://amzn.to/3iDbW8l

Software Defined Radio Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLErU2HjQZ_ZPHRD_m-N5pzrPPdkXa8Fsf

Assign Static IP to wlan0

sudo nano /etc/dhcpcd.conf

interface wlan0
     static ip_address=192.168.1.1/24
     nohook wpa_supplicant

Commit Changes to dhcpcd

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl restart dhcpcd

Install dnsmasq (DNS and DHCP Server)

sudo apt install dnsmasq

Make Backup of dnsmasq.conf

sudo mv /etc/dnsmasq.conf /etc/dnsmasq.conf.orig

Edit dnsmasq.conf

sudo nano /etc/dnsmasq.conf

interface=wlan0
dhcp-range=192.168.1.2,192.168.1.254,255.255.255.0,24h
address=/#/192.168.1.1

Install hostapd (WiFi Access Point Software)

sudo apt install hostapd

Edit hostapd.conf

sudo nano /etc/hostapd/hostapd.conf

Config for Password Protected WiFi Access Point

interface=wlan0
driver=nl80211
ssid=sdr
hw_mode=g
channel=6
wmm_enabled=0
macaddr_acl=0
auth_algs=1
wpa=2
wpa_key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
rsn_pairwise=CCMP
wpa_passphrase=password

Config for Open WiFi Access Point

interface=wlan0
driver=nl80211
ssid=sdr
hw_mode=g
channel=6

Additional Online Resources for WiFi Setup

https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/configuration/wireless/access-point-routed.md

https://w1.fi/cgit/hostap/plain/hostapd/hostapd.conf

Enable WiFi Setup

sudo nano /etc/default/hostapd

DAEMON_CONF="/etc/hostapd/hostapd.conf"

Commit Changes to hostapd and dnsmasq

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl unmask hostapd
sudo systemctl enable hostapd dnsmasq
sudo systemctl start hostapd dnsmasq

Enable Read Only System (Optional)

sudo raspi-config

Advanced Options > Overlay FS

Choose “Yes” to enable overlay file system and/or “Yes” to write protect boot partition.