ADALM-PLUTO support possible with Debian binaries?

[Rob PE1CHL]

I have a system with Debian 10 (buster) which comes with gqrx 2.11.5
It works fine with the RTL2832 and also with SDRplay RSP1A for which I installed their binary driver.
(all the remainder of the system is only installed from the Debian repository configured with "main contrib non-free")

Now I got an ADALM-PLUTO and tried to connect it from gqrx just for fun.  I installed "gr-iio" and "libiio" from the repository.
The PlutoSDR selection does not appear in the list so I selected "Other..." and entered plutosdr=0

It comes up without errormessages, but I think it receives garbage.
There is noise from the speaker, and a spectogram on the display that has a bulge in the middle but it barely changes.
It does not receive local signals.

I presume this is because there is some part of the system that misses required patches, as it is all standard stuff?
Which part could that be?  How can that be debugged?  There are so many components involved in this...
(e.g. is it possible to test at a lower level like gr-osmosdr if the PlutoSDR is working there?)

[Alexandru Csete]

It's not officially supported by gr-osmosdr. I made some initial
support for the receiver, but it got never included upstream.
http://gqrx.dk/supported-hardware#plutosdr

Alex

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[Adrian Musceac]

Hi Rob,
You can use the Plutosdr if you have SoapySDR support built in. You need to install SoapyPlutoSDR. Josh should have the latest version with some of my fixes for Gnu radio in his official Soapy github repo.

Regards,
Adrian

[Rob PE1CHL]

Ok so there appear to be two different routes:

- replace the gr-osmosdr with a version that supports plutosdr

or:

- install an additional module for SoapySDR

Is that correct?  I have SoapySDR as I use that for SDRplay already.

Rob

[Rob PE1CHL]

I installed Soapy/PlutoSDR and use it with device string "soapy=4,device=plutosdr" and now I receive something!  :-)
Performance is terrible compared to the SDRplay but perhaps that is to be expected (no filtering and no frontend).

Thanks.

[redcr...@gmail.com]

In addition to the other info posted in here, there is a nice version of gr-osmosdr supporting adalm-plutosdr (and provides spyserver client functions):

https://github.com/LamaBleu/gr-osmosdr-pluto-spyserver

Between that and soapy support, you should be in like Flynn :-)

Phil AB9IL