{"id":49653,"date":"2021-07-22T07:49:46","date_gmt":"2021-07-22T11:49:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/?p=49653"},"modified":"2021-07-25T07:05:40","modified_gmt":"2021-07-25T11:05:40","slug":"guest-post-and-review-test-driving-the-russia-made-malahit-dsp-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/2021\/07\/guest-post-and-review-test-driving-the-russia-made-malahit-dsp-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Guest Post & Review: Test Driving the Russia-Made Malahit DSP-2"},"content":{"rendered":"

Many thanks to\u00a0SWLing Post<\/em>\u00a0contributor,\u00a0Dan Robinson<\/a>, for the following guest post:<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Test Driving The Russia-Made Malahit DSP-2<\/b><\/h1>\n

P<\/b>oised on Edge of Greatness?\u00a0 (Some Challenges To Overcome)<\/b><\/h3>\n

by Dan Robinson<\/strong><\/p>\n

By now, the Malahit SDR is well known in listening hobby circles.\u00a0 We have the made-in-Russia original, and those manufactured in China with various firmware and some physical differences such as location of the tuning encoders.<\/p>\n

News about the Malahit began to spread in 2019, with articles<\/a> here on the SWLing Post<\/em>, including two in February and April of 2020 (https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/2020\/02\/the-malahit-dsp-a-potential-holy-grail-portable-sdr\/<\/a> and one in which the Malahit was put up against an Afedri LAN-IQ SDR (https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/2020\/04\/fenu-posts-a-malahit-dsp-afedri-lan-iq-head-to-head-comparison\/<\/a> ).<\/p>\n

At the same time, we saw the development and appearance of the Belarusian Belka SDR.\u00a0 I consider the latest Belka DX to be the ideal portable \u2013 a sensitive diminutive miracle that has become a must-have device for many of us.<\/p>\n

As for the Afedri LAN-IQ, I held off on purchasing one until the \u201cStandalone\u201d version was available.\u00a0 It is made in Israel by a Russian developer who supports the receiver with fairly frequent firmware revisions (though upgrading remains a bit of a challenge involving some obscure boot-loading software).<\/p>\n

I waited and observed reviews of the original versions of the Malahit.\u00a0 When its designer, Georgiy (RX9CIM), announced availability of the new DSP-2 version of the receiver, with expanded coverage to 2 GHz and a claim of improved performance, I finally purchased one.<\/p>\n

As was observed in one of the early SWLing Post<\/em> articles \u201cIt seem[ed] the project is open source, the schematic, PCB and software are available to download. . . we hope [these] receivers become popular and available world wide [and that] this new project \u201cshakes\u201d a bit the industry of shortwave receivers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Malahit project authors RX9CIM George, R6DAN Vladimir, and R6DCY Vadim, had the apparent objective of \u201cdesigning a low-cost portable SDR radio, using only easily obtainable components and to become the natural successor of the popular Degen and Tecsun radios.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the time, the price for a finished Malahit, with an ARM chip at its center was about $195 US.\u00a0 Coverage was to 1 GHz \u2013 this has since been extended to 2 GHz.\u00a0 Synchronous AM mode was added, and the DSP-2 also comes with an internal battery tray for a single 18650 Li-on battery.<\/p>\n

This is a change from the original flat Li-on cell, and in my opinion a welcome one\u00a0 since 18650s are easily obtainable.\u00a0 Being able to easily change out a battery is important, rather than messing around with soldering (the famous Reuter Pocket\u00a0receiver made in Germany should take a hint).<\/p>\n

In this age of the SDR, we’re all familiar with the SDRplay series and various AirSpy receivers, along with other SDRs such as the RX666\/888.\u00a0 Before that, we had the famous Perseus, which still has a strong following, and numerous WinRadio receivers.<\/p>\n

See the articles here on the SWLing Post<\/em> assessing the performance of these, as well as reviews at eHam.net, and numerous SDR dongles all over eBay, coming from China.\u00a0 There is also an SDR group on Groups.io<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Of course, receivers and transceivers with panoramic displays began to appear some years ago \u2013 the ICOM IC-R8600 and IC-7300 are examples of how this technology was integrated into the listening and amateur radio markets.<\/p>\n

What we had not seen was integration of this kind of technology into portables.\u00a0 Even in its latest iteration, the Belka DX has a small screen without any PAN display.\u00a0 So, the advent of the Malahit has made this kind of advanced display widely available.<\/p>\n

The price, by the way, for my DSP-2 as of July 2021 was 19,500 Russian rubles, with an extra 2,000 rubles for express delivery via Russian Post (though due to COVID Georgiy stressed that no guarantees could be made as to timing).\u00a0 That’s $263 \u2013 not a small investment and rivaling the cost of a Tecsun ATS-909x and H-501x.<\/p>\n

According to the description I received when ordering, the Malahit DSP-2 was improved over the previous version with the following differences:<\/p>\n