Top all-time · #1652
Daniel Estévez
Personal blog · destevez.netsciencehardware
Daniel Estévez's personal blog at destevez.net covers science and hardware. Since 2016, 42 different Hacker News readers have linked it 141 times, most often “Decoding Voyager 1”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-26, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (15) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Daniel Estévez's blog for detailed signal decoding work, such as decoding Voyager 1 with GNU Radio, along with software-defined radio and communications protocol posts.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 15 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Most-linked posts?
- Decoding Voyager 16 people · 6 mentions · first linked 2021-09-05
- Decoding James Webb Space Telescope3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2021-12-26
- Decoding the Artemis I Orion vehicle3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2022-11-21
- Voyager 1 and Reed-Solomon3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2021-12-11
- Investigating the Galileo Satellite Navigation System Outage with a LimeSDR2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2019-07-17
- JWST Sequential Ranging2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2021-12-31
- LTE Downlink: Synchronization Signals2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2022-04-21
- Not-LoRa GRCon24 CTF Challenge2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2024-09-24
- Timing SDR Recordings with GPS2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2022-03-29
- Voyager-1 single dish detection at Allen Telescope Array2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2021-02-16
What Hacker News says?
One thing that seems missing to me is that while the probe might send 160 bits/sec of useful data, those bits are not sent directly as such[1]: The TMU encodes the high rate data stream with a convolutional code having constraint length of 7 and a symbol rate equal to twice the bit rate (k=7, r=1/2). So the effective symbol rate is 320 baud[2], and thus a factor of two should be included in the calculations from wha…
Comment linking /2021/12/voyager-1-and-reed-solomon/
on “How many photons are received per bit transmitted from Voyager 1?”Submitted Decoding James Webb Space Telescope as a story · 286 points
HN discussionNPUs you can find in AMD high-end CPUs are closer to specialized DSPs (basically big VLIW/SIMD vector units). People love doing heavy math stuff with them ( https://destevez.net/2026/05/getting-peak-tops-on-a-ryzen-ai... - not my blog)
Comment linking /2026/05/getting-peak-tops-on-a-ryzen-ai-7-350-npu/
on “Muse Spark Open”Submitted Gr-satellites – A collection of GNUradio decoders for satellite telemetry as a story · 170 points
HN discussionI enjoy https://destevez.net/about/ from a Phd maths guy, who's worked in satellite comms, and blogs on software defined radio and comms protocols (eg error correction and radio modulation, often in space related contexts, eg decoding Voyager comms).
Comment linking /about/
on “Ask HN: What are the best engineering blogs with real-world depth?”Submitted Imaging Cygnus a at 8.45 GHz with ATA as a story · 166 points
HN discussionHave a look at Daniel Estevez blog. He's a regular user of bigger telescopes (like ATA) and managed to receive and decode Voyager 1. He wrote a GNURadio decoder for it. https://destevez.net/2021/09/decoding-voyager-1/
Comment linking /2021/09/decoding-voyager-1/
on “Ham radio operators receive signals from Voyager 1 on Dwingeloo telescope”Submitted A look at Chang’e 5 telemetry as a story · 154 points
HN discussionGreat question! Voyager 1 does appear to be using ASCII. :D https://destevez.net/2021/09/decoding-voyager-1/
Comment linking /2021/09/decoding-voyager-1/
on “NASA engineers make progress toward understanding Voyager 1 issue”Submitted Investigating the Galileo Satellite Navigation System Outage with a LimeSDR as a story · 151 points
HN discussionYourself and others interested in detail, may appreciate Daniel Estévez's recent post on his use of GNU Radio and the Allen Telescope Array to detect Voyager 1 transmissions: https://destevez.net/2021/02/voyager-1-single-dish-detection... Also this JPL document on both Voyagers is packed. Check out the chart on page 44, regarding diminishing bitrates over the coming years: https://descanso.jpl.nasa.gov/monograph/ser…
Comment linking /2021/02/voyager-1-single-dish-detection-at-allen-telescope-array/
on “Spaceprob.es catalogues all the probes that still communicate with Earth”Submitted Tianwen-1 attitude in Mars orbit as a story · 147 points
HN discussionThere are normally at least two radio links: telemetry and telecommand. Some spacecraft have multiple of each, with at least one channel of each being some sort of emergency channel where you can only do the most basic ops or get the most basic data. As the sibling comment mentions, command signals are normally at least signed, and many times also encrypted. Telemetry is way less sensitive, so it is usually not encr…
Comment linking /2020/08/tianwen-1-telemetry-framing-and-data/
on “Tianwen-1 attitude in Mars orbit”Submitted Demodulation of the LTE uplink as a story · 123 points
HN discussionAnother interesting possibility is to use GPS for a clock. [1] Apparently 1 microsecond accuracy. Maybe useful if you want to make the distance really far. Someone has an article [2] Would be cool if you could pool the resources of multiple amateur rigs over a great distance in ad hoc antenna arrays. [1] https://digitaldisplay.com/network-clock/master-clock/gps-vs... . [2] https://destevez.net/2022/03/timing-sdr-rec…
Comment linking /2022/03/timing-sdr-recordings-with-gps/
on “Lightweight woven helical antenna could replace field-deployed dishes”Submitted Decoding DME aircraft radio navigation system with the LimeSDR as a story · 117 points
HN discussionEven satellites built in 1967 were digital. https://destevez.net/2020/03/decoding-les-5/
Comment linking /2020/03/decoding-les-5/
on “Revisiting Voyager 2 data, a new finding about Uranus's magnetic environment”Submitted More Data from Voyager 1 as a story · 98 points
HN discussionThe estimable (inestimable?) Daniel Estevez wrote excellent blogs on the Voyager comms protocols. https://destevez.net/2021/09/decoding-voyager-1/
Comment linking /2021/09/decoding-voyager-1/
on “Voyager 1 runs on 69 KB of memory and an 8-track tape recorder”Submitted Rain Backscatter on 10 GHz as a story · 88 points
HN discussionIt's Reed-Solomon... https://destevez.net/2021/12/voyager-1-and-reed-solomon/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reed%E2%80%93Solomon_error_cor...
Comment linking /2021/12/voyager-1-and-reed-solomon/
on “Engineers Solve Data Glitch on NASA’s Voyager 1”Submitted N78 band 5G NR recordings as a story · 83 points
HN discussionDaniel Estévez ( https://destevez.net/ ) has lots of interesting blog posts on using tools like GNU Radio and Jupiter to decode transmissions from various objects in space. He's recently also been looking at LTE. I would also recommend CuriousMarc who has done a lot of work with his friends on restoring some radio equipment from the Apollo missions: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v49ucdZcx9s&list=PL-_93BVApb... The…
Comment linking /
on “Ask HN: Which protocols and data formats are used for space communication?”Submitted Decoding Mars 2020 as a story · 69 points
HN discussion> even though there was no computer on Earth at the time fast enough to decode it I'm not sure what is meant by that. Not fast enough to decode in real time? There is/was no need to do that. The transmissions would have gone to tape in any case. Here is a link describing how to decode such a tape : https://destevez.net/2021/09/decoding-voyager-1/
Comment linking /2021/09/decoding-voyager-1/
on “Voyager 1 stops communicating with Earth”Submitted Scientific and Technical Amateur Radio as a story · 57 points
HN discussionNot necessarily leading-edge stuff, but the work he did on Voyager 1 decoding with GNU Radio was fascinating (e.g. https://destevez.net/2021/09/decoding-voyager-1/ ). Same with 802.11ah ( https://destevez.net/2025/01/decoding-ieee-802-11ah/ ). The fact that he puts so much care and attention into describing the methodology as well as the results makes his blog a great educational resource for GNU Radio and communica…
Comment linking /2025/01/decoding-ieee-802-11ah/
on “Daniel Estevez – 10 years of blogging”Submitted Downloading aviation transponder data from GOMX-3 satellite with Gnu-Radio as a story · 57 points
HN discussionNot sure about a mission as old as voyager, but most modern missions use CCSDS protocols, which are open and available online. But just because you know the protocol dues not mean you have enough information to send a valid command. The commands are wrapped in a common protocol, but the commands themselves are typically mission-specific and definitely not made public. Here’s an example of someone unaffiliated with t…
Comment linking /2021/12/decoding-james-webb-space-telescope/
on “NASA has reestablished full communications with Voyager 2”Submitted Decoding Voyager 1 as a story · 55 points
HN discussion
