Baofeng and Signalink

Signalink makes a cable to connect a Baofeng or Wouxun or Kenwood HT to their nifty little box.  The cable is called a SLCABHTW.     One of the nic things is the internal wiring is the same as if you are using the 6 pin DIN connector and you can use the SLMOD6PM jumper module with it.

If used with direwolf and RMS/Express it is plug and play.    If you are using the Baofeng/Signalink combination with FLDIGI you need to tell FLDIGI to make sure in
Configuration->Sound Card->Right Channel you have "Modem signal on right and left channels" selected.     With that, life is great.

Low transmit Volume using the Signalink and TM-V71

I had a problem with low transmit volume when using the Signalink USB sound card connected to the Kenwood TM-V71 radio.   Played with all sorts of settings and then found the problem buried in a Signalink FAQ.

When using the Signalink for 1200 baud packet make sure you DO NOT have the radio set for 9600 baud.   It works, but the transmit audio is very low.   I could hear the transmission on a radio wight the volume turned most of the way up but when the 9600 baud settings were taken off, the transmit volume went what I considered normal.

The Direwolf software TNC shows the audio level of each packet heard.   With 9600 baud enabled on the V71 the level was 2 - 3.    When 9600 baud was disabled on the radio, the audio level went back to 25-30  so it is not just subjective.

Remember,  this is for 1200 baud packet.   Your milage might very if doing something different.

RMS Packet Gateway experiments Windows Version

How to set up an RMS Packet Gateway.  

First of all you have to register it.  I am not there yet since I am still in an experimental stage.  I want to understand how it works before I get it registered and known to the whole world.  I also want to get it right.   The permanent installation will be linux based (I think).   But the easy way to understand the technology is to put up a windows implementation and get a base understanding.   I followed the instructions closely and I got it to work.   These are the two models I have working on the bench reliably.

RMS Relay is normally not necessary.  But in this case since I was not going to register the test setup and I wanted to mail to stay local, RMS Relay gave me that option.

Now that I have something reliable working as a model I can move on to getting the software running in a more permanent configuration.   The hope is that I can get the right Hub/Host software running on a Raspberry PI and go from there.

Kenwood TH-72D TNC Hint

Well I am doing a comparison between the software TNCs , Direwolf, UZ7HO sound modem, AGWPE and have introduced the Hardware TNC that is built into my Kenwood TH-72D handheld unit.     It was fairly easy to move from doing APRS to being a KISS TNC.   Just press the TNC button on the front panel until you see the message move from APRS12 to PACKET12 and make sure the USB port is on and you are set.  

Weird problem is that it would work intermittently.   Worked pretty well and would drop loose a packet or two and work again.    I wound up looking at various setting and then turned off the GPS and everything started working perfectly.     I am guessing the GPS was adding some data to serial stream and corrupting some of the AX.25 packets.  

So the hint.    Turn off the GPS if using the unit as a generic TNC.

What is Winlink?

A new video has been released.  It is pretty good for people wanting to know what is winlink

https://youtu.be/qGhUfW8pjY8

RMS Express P2P over VHF/UHF

Getting the software TNC working was in preparation for getting RMS-Express point to point working.   It worked and was very simple.

I used the 441.025 and listened for a few min to make sure no one was using the frequency.

Both sides were set to use 1200 baud packet on the RF side.

Side A was a PC connected to an Icom IC-7100 using a USB cable and that was it.
   On this PC I had the RMS-Express, Direwolf and C7200 software packages running.

Side B was a second PC connected to a Kenwood TH-D72 using a USB Cable
   On this PC only RMS-Express was needed and the builtin software in RMS-Express
   The TH-D72 was set to use the Packet12 TNC (selected using the TNC button on the faceplate)

I set Side A to be KK4SIH-4 and Side B to be KK4SIH-7

On the A side I started up the Packet P2P server inside of RMS Express

On the B side I created a message destined for KK4SIH-4 and clicked on the P2P button before moving it to the outbox.   Then opened a Packet P2P session and hit start.

The message transferred with no issues.   It also worked in reverse.

The next step is to see if I can get 9600 baud working .

TS-590 USB Drivers

I was setting up a new PC to work with the Kenwood TS590s and it took me a minute to find the right drivers.   Figured I would put up a pointer for the next time I need to do it.

http://www.silabs.com/products/mcu/pages/usbtouartbridgevcpdrivers.aspx