Hacking My Ceiling Fan Radio Signal With a $15 USB TV Tuner (RTL2832U)

Armed with just a USB TV Tuner, I decode the RF commands that my ceiling fan remote sends so that I can incorporate it into my "smart home" system.
Part 2: • Abusing Raspberry Pi G...
I demo using a stock Raspberry Pi 3B to transmit these radio commands.
I got my RTL2832U tuner off eBay, which is usually the cheapest place to get them: rover.ebay.com/rover/1/711-53...
Just make sure to find a buyer in your country if you don't want to wait for shipping from China. Mine was actually purchased in 2016 but they haven't changed much since then.
If you're interested in getting one of these USB SDRs yourself, know that even with the same RTL2832U chip, they incorporate different tuners with different frequency ranges. My tuner, shown in the video, has the Rafael Micro R820T which is also the most common one you'll find. You can find more details about the different tuners here: wiki.radioreference.com/index...
Links to the software used:
Spektrum: github.com/pavels/spektrum
Universal Radio Hacker: github.com/jopohl/urh
There's a ton of software out there that can use the RTL-SDR, these are just the two that I used to accomplish this task.
Background music:
Puzzle Jukebox - Parallel Lofi Chill / parallel-lofi-chill
Hybrid V - Shibuya Station / shibuya-station-royalt...
Some of the links in my video descriptions may get me referral compensation which help support my channel.

[@killbit]

Great video and perfectly presented. Speed and explanation was spot on.

[@skeeviesteve1071]

Please keep posting videos! The subs will come, be patient.... don't change anything, these are perfect! Thanks

[@OskarP2601]

what?? this vid is rlly high quality i expected this to come from a channel with at least 200k subs. keep it up! 👍

[@CheffreyGriffin]

I tripped over this video while searching for how to control a USB thermal POS printer with raspberry Pi. I ended up watching the whole video. Super interesting and well put together. Great video!

[@nosbig6462]

Surprised there's not more views this is super good video/editing quality/ Also congrats on 1k subs!

[@riveducha]

Thanks! And 1k has been a loong time coming haha

[@edoncieu]

Congrats, very educative!

[@EthanTrewhitt]

What a fantastic tutorial. Thanks!

[@animehawaiiTECH]

Subbed! Great content! I did it with my roll up roof

[@aim__freakz8499]

how are you always coming up with those ideas? really cool

[@jdjr3640]

Redditor here. This grade A content! Feasible, reasonable, and and easily understood! Keep up the great work! 👍

[@dennisasamoah2213]

Really mindblowing

[@cabasse_music]

this is awesome. are you using spektrum and universal radio hacker on the pi itself or do you have a desktop install of linux?

[@riveducha]

I’m running the SDR receiver on my desktop, but I don’t think there’s any theoretical reason why you couldn’t do it on the Pi instead.

[@daleatkin8927]

Holy heck that is cool.

[@vadimm6432]

Awesome! Thnx for sharing

[@j1_dev]

Really, really cool

[@tsutsid5361]

I want to see if you can hack radio with that USB

[@peteluo5367]

Awesome!

[@Sp3rickhj]

hey i need to get the signal of a 2.4ghz controller, i can do it with a normal wifi antenna that support 2?

[@skeeviesteve1071]

Awesome

[@Alsoxavi]

Second part!!!!

[@mikietonon]

My spektrum reading is nowhere near as stable as yours appears to be. I have the exact same USB and antenna.

[@shayypy]

I've been trying to do this myself, but unfortunately I'm having some trouble. I purchased the USB TV tuner linked in the description, but I can't get my computer to recognize it (I'm on windows). Spektrum doesn't seem to work on Raspberry Pi 4s, which is what I have, so no luck there, and I don't have another Linux machine available.
My tuner came with a CD that includes a driver, but even after installing it I can't get Windows to even recognize that something has been plugged in. The light's on, but Windows shows nothing. If anyone has any tips they would be greatly appreciated.

[@riveducha]

Hmm, you might be able to do it on your Raspberry Pi using other programs. I know there are other programs like GNU Radio and freqshow. And even spektrum should work in theory but you might need to compile some stuff from source.

[@riveducha]

Oh, actually I re-read your comment and realized something. You probably don't want the Windows drivers that came with your TV tuner because those drivers are for watching TV. The Spektrum README says to use this to install WinUSB (I haven't tried it myself): zadig.akeo.ie/

[@shayypy]

@@riveducha I tried out that program but since Windows doesn't seem to recognize the device being plugged in, I can't select it in Zadig. I decided to boot into Ubuntu with a USB stick but the tuner didn't get recognized there either. Maybe there's something wrong with my tuner.

[@forxan]

Hi everyone,
I would like to be able to receive the signal from a controller with an HCS301 (MICROCHIP KeeLoq) in the transmitter and with a PICxxx or an ATMELxxx in the receiver.
There is a library for ARDUINO about receiving the signal from an HCS301 and another to emit the signal from an HCS301, but I can't find it... I'm still looking.
Greetings to all.