Hi John, At the time I was listening to the frequency there were RTTY stations on either side and very close, so did not attempt a connection.
Were you using ALE400 or FAE400? My understanding is that FAE is faster than the ALE with plain text due to compression which I don't think is available in ALE400. I have never quite understood the purpose of the ALE modes unless perhaps it was used for a group (non ARQ) transmission. But in such a case wouldn't you want to use a better mode than ALE which is an older technology from the 1970's and developed before the advent of sound card modes and computer access. When I have tried the wide 141A (ALE/FAE 2000) modes, they have not been as practical to use for the conditions you normally find on the lower bands. FAE2000 might work reasonably well on higher bands with low ISI/Doppler. The speed is several times faster, but the bandwidth is about 5 times wider and less robust. The reasons that I am so impressed with FAE400: - relatively narrow (keeping under 500 Hz) to meet the IARU band plan bandwidths designated for the RTTY/Data portion of 80 meters - has compression which can greatly increase speed - first sound card ARQ mode with the full ASCII character set - first sound card mode employing memory ARQ The only other mode that may have some of these characteristics is Winmor, but that has not been released yet. What has been surprising to me is that few hams have any interest in using these connected modes, especially for public service/emergency use. 73, Rick, KV9U John Bradley wrote: > > After an evening of limited testing, VE6OG and I found ALE400 much > better on a file transfer tonight, given the band conditions and > > QRM. > > > > Both stations remain on for the rest of the night and early morning . > > > > John > > VE5MU > >
