rtl-sdr for Debian ------------------- In the beginning Antti Palosaari noticed that some digital video receiver tuners can be turned into a cheap software defined radio. Since there is also support in the Linux kernel to use these devices as digital video receivers, by default the hardware will be claimed by Linux keernel drivers for that purpose. Having these rtl-sdr packages installed likely means that these devices should be available for the alternate software defined radio use. The librtlsdr0 package in Debian has configuration files to help manage the conflicting uses: 1. Blacklists DVB-T kernel modules provided by the Linux kernel ------------------------------------------------------------------- Config file: /etc/modprobe.d/librtlsdr-blacklist.conf contains lines to blacklist dvb_usb_rtl28xxu, e4000 and rtl2832 kernel modules. Should you wish to use a device via the Linux video receiver software while still having the librtlsdr0 package installed you may edit this file. (Placing a # at the beginning os a line makes it a comment.) Then unplug/plug the USB stick. Not that if rtl-sdr applications are then run, they will complain about failing to open the device. In that case, restore the blacklist and unplug/plug the USB stick. If librtlsdr-blacklist.conf does not exist, then rtl-sdr was built with the DETACH_KERNEL_DRIVER option. 2. Permissions -------------- Devices are available to users in the plugdev group. The librtlsdr0 package installs these default rules: /lib/udev/rules.d/60-librtlsdr0.rules If you have permissions issues, you may override these values with your own rules in /etc: /etc/udev/rules.d/60-librtlsdr0.rules After editing udev rules, run as root: udevadm control --reload-rules