AmateurRadio.com

Only a few hours left to grab some great Cyber Monday deals on radio equipment:

Yaesu FT-2900R
$149.95 (Reg. $179.95)
HRO (http://www.hamradio.com/detail.cfm?pid=H0-010078)

Yaesu FT-60R
$174.95 (Reg. $199.95)
HRO (http://www.hamradio.com/detail.cfm?pid=H0-007323)

Yaesu FTM-350R
$399.95 (Reg. $569.95)
HRO (http://www.hamradio.com/detail.cfm?pid=H0-010405)

Icom IC-7000 w/ RMK-7000
$1098.49 (Reg. $1254.95)
HRO (http://www.hamradio.com/detail.cfm?pid=H0-008093)

Icom IC-7600
$3297.49 (Reg. $3749.95)
HRO (http://www.hamradio.com/detail.cfm?pid=H0-009884)

Icom IC-92AD
$469.95 (Reg. $559.95)
HRO (http://www.hamradio.com/detail.cfm?pid=H0-009325)

Join ARRL for 3 years and get your choice of the ARRL Operating Manual or the ARRL Antenna Book as a free gift. Use web code “LME” to take advantage of the offer.
http://www.arrl.org/join/lme

Know of any other great Cyber Monday deals for hams? Leave a comment and share!

I rolled over another year on the odometer of life last week and as is the custom around here, I received some gifts, several of which were radio-related.  The shirt is from my wife.  The Yamaha CM500 headset is from my parents.

Both of these came in good time since my “CW is the Real Thing” shirt is getting threadbare and my ProSet developed a bad spot in the cable in the past week.  I got to try them both out for a brief period at the W8AV multi-two operation in the CQ WW contest over the weekend.

The CM500 (the manufacturer page for these is gone, but you can get them from the usual places) came as highly recommended by the denizens of the Elecraft reflector via the PVRC reflector.  They’re pretty good headphones.  The sound is good and they have plenty of volume when driven by a TS-930.  The ear pads are a little thicker than those on the ProSet, which is good because after a few hours, my ears feel pinched by it.  The big downfall of the CM500 is that it feels a little bit like my head is in a vise when I wear them.  There may be an adjustment for that.

I was originally thinking that I should send the ProSet back to Heil to be refurbished.  But, the price is much higher than I remembered.  Fortunately, they stock parts for the old models.  So, I will be doing the refurbishing myself.

In WW news, I only operated for about two hours on Sunday afternoon at W8AV.  Goose replaced his big tower with a new one and the lower 40-meter antenna was not back up yet.  But, with a single 2-element Yagi at 140ish-feet and 1.5 kW from a homebrew 8877, I easily carved out a spot around 7064 kHz at 2000 UT and ran off a nice string of Europeans just as the band was opening.

I have just uploaded a minor update to the Windows version of KComm, my logging and digital modes program for Elecraft K2 and K3 transceivers. Version 1.91 now supports the ability to specify the receive and transmit sound devices using the device name rather than a number which Windows appeared to change at will.

I had been unable to find a way to get the sound card device names from Windows using Free Pascal and happened to mention this during a discussion in the Yahoo digital modes group about how so many sound card programs seemed to lose the sound card settings under newer versions of Windows. Patrick, F6CTE, who is the author of MultiPSK, very kindly responded with some Delphi Pascal code to list the installed sound devices. This has now been incorporated in KComm and makes sound card selection much easier – especially for me as I am always adding and removing USB audio devices on the shack computer which changes the numbering.

My grateful thanks to Patrick for his help with this little problem.

Episode 50: A milestone!

Announcements:

• Russ talks about his California trip: attending the Large Installation Systems Administration conference (LISA).
• The 50th episode is a milestone – Richard explains why. See also The Internet Archive.
• Lord Drachenblut reminds us of the upcoming Indiana LinuxFest in Indianapolis, Indiana. If you’d like to register, use the promotional code LHSPODCAST50 (all capital letters) and you’ll get a $15.00 discount on the ticket.
• Music in this episode is from 20lb Sounds, fronted by Dan Lynch of Linux Outlaws fame.

Topics:

• Scott, AD7MI, posted an article on his blog about moving to an all-Linux ham shack. Richard and Russ discuss the article, including Shackbox Linux, Ham Radio Deluxe, CQRLog, and more. Ultimately, Fldigi and CQRLog resulted in “100% Linux Nirvana”.
• Scott also asks what we think would be the ideal Linux-based ham shack. Russ describes his shack, which he thinks IS ideal. Our hosts then discuss various soundcard interfaces:
  • RigBlaster
  • MicroHAM
  • Rascal
• Most sound cards work fine, and Russ recommends the SoundBlaster series over all, but suggests staying away from the SoundBlaster Audigy SE (model CA0106) sound cards as they don’t seem to work well (or at all) under Linux.
• Richard likes his Yaesu FT-897D. Most modern rigs allow a fixed-audio level connection to the computer sound card, as well as computer rig control. Russ has the Kenwood TS-570D, and it, too, is well-supported in the Linux ham libraries.
• Russ and Richard discuss the fact that most hams don’t log VHF/UHF contacts, other than in contests or toward an award.
• The FCC, created by the Communications Act of 1934, included the requirement to maintain a log book in the rules. Sometime between 1983 and 1986, this requirement was dropped as the FCC determined that the information was of little use to them. (If someone can point us to a reference that identifies when the exact rule change occurred, please let us know. I was unable to find the specific change online. -Ed.)

Feedback:

• Leif, KC8RWR, writes that Internet over EME (earth-moon-earth) isn’t likely to work due to the high latency involved. (This may be in reference to a comment in Episode 48.) NASA and DARPA are involved in a Deep-Space Internet project.
• Leif also asks “Isn’t Morse code dead?” and wasn’t it replaced by “Gerke Code”? Our hosts discuss.
• Craig, KB5UEJ, writes that he thinks Russ’ audio is louder and muddier than Richard’s in episodes 46 and 47. Russ agrees that the audio on a few of the recent episodes did suffer, but should be much improved now.
• Grant, KC9SJQ, comments that he doesn’t see a link to Russ’ screencast about SSL anywhere. Yes, it somehow disappeared, but Russ is working on it. He’ll either find the file or redo it.
• William, KB9TMP, sends his comments about Episode 48 where we discuss KE9V’s article that questioned the relevance of amateur radio.
• Craig, KB5UEJ, commenting about WSPR, says that you can run less than 5W on an FT-897 by reducing the audio drive from the computer to the radio. Richard points out that the reduction is often not uniform across the audio freqeuncies used, so some intelligibility may be lost. He had that problem with packet, but he’ll try it with WSPR.
• Matt wants to know the artist and title of a song in Episode 48. The song was “Endline (Choose Nothing)” by I Am Not Lefthanded from the album “Yes Means No”. Check out the show notes for Episode 48 for a link to the song.

Donations:

• Scott, AD7MI, sent a donation just before we recorded! Thanks, Scott.
• If you’d like to help the podcast, please consider making a donation. It’s easy! Just a click on the Donate button on the web site.

Contact Info:

• Contact Richard at [email protected], Russ at [email protected], or both at the same time at [email protected].
• Listen to the live stream every other Tuesday at 8:00pm Central time. Check the LHS web site for dates.
• Leave us a voice mail at 888-455-0305 or 417-200-4811, or record an introduction to the podcast.
• Sign up for the LHS mailing list.
• Sign up for the MAGNetcon mailing list.
• Thanks to Dave from Gamma Leonis for the theme music.

Music:

• Redemption Song performed by 20lb Sounds.
• Jimmy Carter, also by 20lb Sounds.

Last weekend I enjoyed running my 1W WSPR system up on 7MHz and was surprised by just how far it went. I wondered how a 1W CW signal would fare this weekend on the same band, given the activity in the CQWW CW contest. The activity of course is both a good thing; plenty of people to call and a bad thing; lots of interference.

After I’d finished writing my Practical Wireless column today I tuned up 7MHz and checked the output was set at 1W. I did what the low power guys recommend and called the loud ones. After all, if they’re way over S9, I shouldn’t be *that* many dB down!

First in the log was EA2EA, quickly followed by DF0HQ. RX4W, 9A1A, YL9W and OG2A all get the ‘Golden Ears’ award! By that stage I’d lost interest, having proven that it worked, but made a note to try 7MHz later when it opened to the USA.

I was curious whether 28MHz would be open. Certainly not in a major way, but I could hear some African activity and some meteor bursts from European activity. I kept tuning up and down waiting to see what would appear. What appeared was PJ4A. They took a little working, but after a minute or two I had them in the log. Also coming in from the Caribbean were ZF1A (great to hear, as I’ve operated from there!) and KP3Z though I only heard those two briefly. Some US stations were heard, though not worked; KC1XX, W4SUL, AD4ES and K1TO amongst others. An hour or so later, I checked the band again and was interested to hear C5A coming through. To my surprise, and how often does this happen when you run 100W to a vertical, they came back first call.

After supper, I thought it was time to see if I could work the US on 7MHz with 1W. KC1XX was the poor unfortunate I picked. But we did it! It took a few repeats but the team there pulled all the information out and I was glad to hear that they took a lot of care to make sure they’d got the information ok. Next time guys, I promise I’ll call with higher power and make an easier QSO for you.

I enjoyed the 1W challenge. No doubt Justin will be pleased I played ‘real radio’, but I suspect that my next 1W operation will probably be on WSPR again!

I have not been keeping up with the development of the controversial ROS digital mode as for reasons given in earlier posts I decided it was not something I wanted to use. However a recent post in the Yahoo digital modes group brought to my attention a development that seems rather alarming. The ROS software has recently included an anti-jamming switch the purpose of which is described as “improves rejection against strong CW and Beacons interferences.”

Polite usage of the amateur bands require that you check the frequency is in use before making a call so no-one should be jamming anybody. Furthermore, no-one should be using ROS in the CW or beacon sub bands. So what exactly is the purpose of this switch and why should anyone need it?

Perhaps an inkling of what may be going to happen can be drawn from some of the comments relating to the performance of the anti-jam switch, for example:

• “The New ROS/2000 passed the test successfully during the CW Contest last weekend.”
• “More test with the New ROS/2000 in other hostile environment. This time during a PSK63 Contest on Sunday.”

As I said all along (indeed, this was my original objection to the use of this mode) ROS is just too wide for use in the narrow digital allocations of the HF bands. There just isn’t the space for it, unless it remains a niche, occasionally used mode, which clearly its developer and supporters don’t intend it to be. As another comment in the ROS forum states: “The bands will fill up once people realize how good this mode is.”

The development of anti-jam techniques suggest that ROS is being readied to engage in war with users of other modes. When users can’t find a clear frequency they will just operate on top of other modes. The principal claimed advantage of the wide ROS mode is that it enables contacts to be made under similar weak signal conditions to JT65A but that it permits keyboard chats to take place rather than the basic exchange of signal reports and locators. So it appears that a vast swathe of spectrum space is going to be made unusable for other modes simply so that people can exchange brag files.

We need strict regulation of digital modes on the amateur bands. The days of gentlemen’s agreements are over. There are too many modes competing for limited spectrum space, and too many hams who aren’t gentlemen.

Years ago here in the States, a company called Folgers aired TV commercials in which they replaced the coffee in fine restaurants with Folger’s Crystals, an instant coffee.  The premise was the product was so good, patrons wouldn’t know the difference.  I’m sure the advertising campaign was a boon to Folgers as years later you will once in awhile hear someone say about secretly replacing something with Folger’s Crystals.

For years Linux advocates have been promoting the use of Linux in the hamshack, often bragging how their shacks are 100% “Windows free.”  As I have mentioned in past blog articles, I’ve attempted several times over the past eight or more years to migrate totally to Linux in the shack and have been unsuccessful each time.  I’m no dummy when it comes to Linux.  I have used it since 1995 when nearly all tasks were done in the bash shell and XWindows was a cumbersome novelty that was difficult to configure and was scorned by many.  Being able to copy and paste something from one app to another or configure something by right-clicking it was a luxury light years away.

Each time I get involved in these discussions about Linux in the shack (the most recent on QRP-L.org), several people will say that Linux does have enough amateur radio applications to replace Windows.  But there’s a caveat that none of these evangelists seem to grasp: the functionality of Linux logging and contesting applications doesn’t come close to Windows counterparts.  I often use three applications as the “yardsticks” by which Linux logging and contest applications should be measured against: Ham Radio Deluxe, DXLab, and N1MM.  These are all free programs so there can’t be any debate about evil corporations making a profit developing the software.  The self-proclaimed “world’s best Linux logging program”, CQRLog, is a fine program with a very clean interface that does basic logging, award tracking, and rig control.  It’s a great program if that’s all you want to do, but it’s not an equivalent to HRD or DXLab.  On the contesting front, I don’t know of any Linux program that comes close to what N1MM does.  Quite simply, if one intends on using Linux exclusively in the hamshack they have to lower their expectations and requirements for logging and are between a rock and a hard place when it comes to contesting.

Digital aficionados are in luck, however.  Fldigi is a wonderful multi-protocol digital modem program that is as good as or even better than Windows digital modem programs.  Unfortunately the arcaneness of the Linux sound system can cause much heartache and sorrow, but the program itself is superb.

Frequently in these discussions the instability of Windows will be mentioned.  If one believed all of the rants about how bad Windows is, one would think a Windows box with an uptime of several hours is a rare thing and Windows machines are plagued with thousands of viruses a day and running anything beyond Solitaire is an exercise in torture.  Patching and updating is an endless treadmill requiring hours of attention each week.  I’m not sure where this view comes from, but desktop Windows has been quite stable since XP and reasonably maintained Windows servers can be expected to run for years with few problems.

Replacing restaurant coffee with Folger’s Crystals fooled restaurant patrons because it actually had the same taste, appearance, and aroma of restaurant coffee.  Linux ham applications right now can replace Windows digital modem functionality, but those wanting a full-bodied cup of logging or contesting applications are out of luck.  I wish Linux amateur radio advocates would realize that not everyone is willing to live with limited functionality in order to use a non-Windows operating system.  Linux may be a viable alternative operating system, but the current crop of amateur radio applications are not slam-dunk alternatives to Windows applications like some claim.