When I left ham radio in the late 90s, I was playing with Packet radio on 2 meters. It was all the rage at the moment. Actually, it wasn’t a ‘new’ thing by the time I got involved, it had probably been around 15 years or longer. But it was ‘cutting edge’ tech for the new ham.
I had to spend a little scratch to get a packet modem, they were running upwards of $200-400 at the time.
For those that may have forgotten what Packet could do, you could interconnect packet machines up on a network and send messages across the country by breaking messages into small packets and sending them in bursts over VHF. These packets would travel through the ‘net’ and arrive at the distant end to be reassembled. A user would interface a transceiver with a modem device that would run a sort of BBS (bulletin board system). At any rate, I can’t remember much of the details aside from the fact that I briefly ran a packet BBS here in Omaha before pulling the plug on ham radio altogether.
Things have changed. I don’t even know if anyone uses Packet these days. I’m sure it’s possible and now everything can be run on a PC with software and a dongle that connects to the computer.
But there is significantly more going on with digital modes.. There is a long list of them including: RTTY (old school stuff like we did back in the Navy) and newer stuff like FT8 and JS8Call.
I watched a couple of videos and read some posts on the internets and pretty soon I decided I wanted to give it a shot. Thankfully, this is one of those things that doesn’t cost $400 like Packet did in 1995.
I decided to drop $40 on the Xiegu CE-19 Expansion Port. Essentially a device that connects the rig to the computer audio ports to send and receive digital data. Another cable connects the rig to the radio via USB and allows you to control your radio–from tuning the frequency and changing the bands to managing other settings as well.
First thing first, the documentation from Xiegu is lackluster at best. And maybe that’s fine for an experienced ham but I’m rusty and out of touch and I’ve forgotten more than I remember.
I was really interested in JS8Call more so than FT8. The later mode is a fairly limited mode that uses very short (13 char) preformatted messages to establish communications, pass a signal report, and then send a 73.
There is no free flow of information. No rag chewing and it’s pretty boring.
JS8Call, on the other hand, is based on FT8 but allows for longer conversations typed out and sent in short bursts. I’ve only managed one JS8Call QSO so far but I’ve racked up a couple dozen FT8 contacts.
I’ll admit, there is something exciting about making a contact with someone from Spain on 10 watts. It’s just… so limiting. But it is what is it.
JS8Call, on the other hand, *seems* like it should be more interesting and more useful. Unfortunately, there is significantly less activity on JS8Call. Or I’m not spending enough time listening. Admittedly, I’m still struggling with my shitty antenna install. The G5RV may not have been the best investment.
I found that, for me, the JS8Call software didn’t like the configuration I was using to connect to my rig. I kept getting ‘hamlib’ errors and just couldn’t get the rig control to work.
I saw a youtube video where this fella suggested using FLRIG to control the rig connection and, to my great surprise, it worked perfectly without a lot of effort.
FLRIG is great. You configure and run the software and then launch WSJT-X, JS8Call, or FLDIGI (I’ll mention that another time).
I’ve had a few ‘bugs’ with my rig with a couple of BSOD events and a weird glitch that causes the rig settings to change when I close FLRIG with the USB dongle connected to the rig, it enables Squelch (a setting that isn’t not controlled by a discrete button) which then has to be undone manually.
Now, if I can just get my G5RV up a bit higher and stretched out a little tighter, I think I might have better signals on the digital modes.