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Receiver controls
Optional Antenna site in Signal source accepts manual coordinates or Use my location (one explicit browser fix). Sites stay in the current tab unless Remember exact site in this browser is selected. New recordings and explicitly copied survey profiles include the acquisition site/source/fix time/accuracy; tuning share links and Favorites omit it. Replay preserves the original site. Remote antenna sites are entered manually for the confirmed receiver/band and never use the listener's device location.
Receiver and Explorer are the two primary workspace tabs. Beside Compact, Settings contains Integration settings and Reset view; Help contains Help & setup and About BrowserSDR. Open diagnostics is available in the receiver-status menu, which keeps receiving/recording state and issue counts visible. Auxiliary pages include a return button to the last workspace.
Compact sits beside receiver status in the top bar, reduces panel spacing and gives more room to the plot. Signal source and Channel settings collapse independently using their own hide/show buttons. The tool dock uses compact audio, recording and session summaries; More space expands it for decoder tables, maps and broadcast images. These appearance choices persist locally; Reset view in the header’s Settings menu restores the comfortable layout. Desktop receiver windows at least 1181 × 900 use the available height; compact also fits laptop windows at least 1181 × 640, with optional controls scrolling inside their panels. Smaller screens retain document flow and the numbered receive workflow.
Use ★ Favorites below the tuning controls in Channel settings to open the overlay and save a named channel with mode, bandwidth, squelch, CW tone or SRD settings, tags and notes. Search, edit, reorder and delete locally, and export/import a versioned JSON backup (200 favorites / 256 KiB maximum). Escape, Close or the backdrop dismiss the overlay and keep unfinished edits for reopening in the current Receiver view; Back to favorites cancels the edit. Successful recall closes the overlay; rejected recall keeps its explanation visible. Imports merge by ID, skip identical entries and reject conflicting IDs or invalid backups before changing anything. Storage errors are visible; export before closing a tab if persistence failed.
Recall uses the currently selected receiver and checks its RF limits and mode/rate compatibility. It never connects USB or starts reception. Active recordings, scans, transfers and retained captures block recall. A stopped receiver can choose a compatible rate; an incompatible running route requires stopping first. Atlas station results can be saved directly as favorites. A saved catalog reference is unconfirmed and is not automatically reused as fresh capture identity evidence. These are browser-local bookmarks; cloud sync and live session streaming remain future work.
Session → Share settings creates a link for the configured channel (all receive modes and their options), Compact view and spectrum scale. The recipient previews it, then applies it while reception is stopped; the selected source stays local and connecting/Start remain manual. The link includes no recordings, favorites, tokens or device details. Copy can fall back to selecting the visible link. Local demo addresses work on the same computer; generate links on the published site to send to another person.
Receiver tuning separates Receiver, directly above the spectrum, from Channel frequency in Channel settings. Receiver center moves the captured RF window while preserving the selected channel's absolute frequency. To channel aligns the two once. The Follow channel switch is enabled by default and remembered locally: channel tuning moves the receiver only when the complete channel and its edge guard no longer fit in the capture window. With it disabled, an out-of-window tune is rejected without interrupting reception. Some digital modes at lower sample rates require the channel at the receiver center. Replay's capture center is fixed. Frequency fields, spectrum markers and the header use three decimals in MHz (1 kHz display precision). Focusing a frequency field exposes six decimals (1 Hz) for editing; accepted hardware values retain their original precision. The spectrum toolbar groups display controls, the receiver frequency and Set, then Follow channel and To channel, wrapping whole groups when needed. Relative levels (not dBm) and channel offset appear inside the plot. The translucent info button in the waterfall's lower-right corner opens FFT & display details without resizing the plot; Escape, Close or clicking away dismisses it. Display settings remains below the plot for active controls. Set or Enter applies a frequency edit; Escape cancels it. Fine-tune signal measures and corrects the channel frequency independently of receiver centering.
Click Connect to grant a device the first time. On later page loads, BrowserSDR silently reconnects the first already-authorized device matching the saved source; it does not start reception or audio automatically. If no matching authorization exists, Connect opens the chooser. Use an RTL2832U dongle with an R820/R828/R860 tuner and close other SDR applications before connecting. Select Spectrum only · no demodulation to keep RF acquisition, spectrum, waterfall, Explorer and I/Q recording active without feeding an audio or digital decoder. The other choices are WBFM, NBFM, AM, USB, LSB, CW, DAB/DAB+, ADS-B, AIS, SRD, APRS and RS41; bandwidth and squelch appear only where supported. In CW, choose a carrier-centered 100, 250, 500 or 1,000 Hz receive filter (500 Hz by default) and a 300–1,000 Hz beat tone (600 Hz by default). The beat-tone control changes only the audible pitch: the selected and displayed RF frequency remains the received carrier frequency. Automatic gain is the default, with an optional 0–49.6 dB requested manual setting. While running, enter a frequency and press Enter or use Tune, or click within the displayed RF span. Nearby channels are selected digitally within the captured passband; larger moves retune the tuner. Center and selected frequencies are shown separately. For RTL-SDR, change the sample rate in Device details & settings while receiving: BrowserSDR resumes automatically after a brief gap, keeping USB and audio connected. An active recording finishes before the switch. The selected channel is preserved; Follow channel permits recentering if the smaller span requires it. Incompatible decoder rates are unavailable. For HackRF and bladeRF, stop reception to change rate; the next Start reconfigures the open device without another chooser or disconnect. Display pause does not stop reception. Floor/range controls recolor both current spectrum and stored waterfall power. Select Synthetic spectrum demo and click Start demo to validate the analysis path without granting USB access. Spectrum values are relative dB, not calibrated dBm.