At 04:57 AM 1/7/2008, Rick wrote: >I sure wish more hams would work on solving this problem, rather than >exacerbating the situation and being part of the problem. > >Just a few minutes ago I was trying to have a Q with VE5MU using FAE 400 >around 10137. A Pactor station starting transmitting right over our >frequency. > >It is really unbelievable how hams think this is acceptable. It is just >plain illegal operation. Period. There is no other way to call it. The >Pactor station was S-9 at my location so I doubt very much if that >station did not hear one of us and we had been on for quite some time >before that happened. > >73, > >Rick, KV9U
I bet that guy did not have a clue, he has a hardware box that can only use Amtor/Pactor. probably PSK31 and a couple of other modes.....most of which he can't, or has never used. He has probably never been on any Internet forums or newsgroups, so he has not a clue what is going on in the digital world of Ham Radio, nor does he probably care. I would cite a lack of knowledge of modes and bandwidths etc on his part, maybe he thinks the various digital modes all have retrys and error correction......so it will just sort itself out and all modes will simply "share" frequencies! Yesterday, I was on 20m and I heard a stack of signals which were not Pactor (I had a Pactor sked setup) I switched to PSK31 on my hardware box....no go. I fired up HRD on my SLUSB, still no go :-( I was not sure what signals they were, to be able to try and resolve them, being just interested in what they were. Being a little tone deaf and not having an intimate knowledge of all the modes and what they sound like, did not help me. Were they MT63? PSK250? I don't know............ If you run Digipan, you have no hope! With the increasing number of new modes being developed, the problem will get worse :-( Add the coming of improved propagation and this will become a spectrum quagmire in which no one will be able to operate easily. We have all helped create the mess we have. A gazillion software programs, all doing their "own thing" some with many modes and expanding more modes, nearly daily, others that don't have so many modes. No software that I know of has a decoder function, with an "identify signal" menu. Unless the software guys can come up with something like that as an integrated or standalone solution, the schemozzle will get worse. IF people can identify a signal, with callsigns, they will be less inclined to interfere with it, if a operator can't resolve a signal.....they probably care a lot less about any interference to it. Sadly, only soundcard software solutions can be given this signal decoder ability, hardware boxes are a different deal. You need operator digital modes knowledge too, many people do not know what all the modes sound like, I know I don't, even though I have a recording of mode sounds that someone on the group was good enough to post! Now, this is not bagging all the good people, who do software development for the benefit of Hams, for little or no cost BUT...... Someone bright enough to do it.......is going to have to write that "signal decoder" program very soon.........otherwise this whole problem will get worse. Fixing the WinLink problem is another deal altogether. 73s Jack VK4JRC
