With the ESP32 series of microcontrollers having had hidden software-defined radio (SDR) facility revealed, we’re now moving on from the announcement into projects making use of the finding. [Twotoz] has one using an ESP32-C5, to receive and demodulate analog FM video.

You might think that video is something which has largely gone away in 2026, with TV transmissions having made the switch more than a decade ago, and home entertainment appliances having used HDMI for longer. But it’s still very popular in the world of drones however, where it exists as 5 GHz FM transmission. There’s no digital cliff-edge to lose your picture if you fly into somewhere with bad propagation of radio waves, and perhaps more importantly, it has an extremely low latency. This receiver uses a Seeed Studio Xiao ESP32-C5 board with a simple resistor-ladder DAC to produce the video. It has a simple button channel interface, and a serial link for more in-depth options.

It’s good to see these projects appear, especially as this one’s 5 GHz and shows those chips work too with the hack. We’d be interested to know whether the latency of the SDR affects its usability though. You may be interested to know this isn’t the first time we’ve seen an SDR do video.

Thanks [Ink] for the tip!