Dale,
Sounds like you live in an isolated area. Some people would enjoy that. At least you can master your long distant and HF communications. Try working satellite… they won’t know how isolated you are. As for D*STAR you could go the cheap route and purchase a dongle and work via the internet if you have a high speed connection. Then there is always echolink! Just teasing you. I understand your point. It seems most new hams aren’t even taking the time to learn the theory, just learning the answers to the test. I guess I fault the guys that encourage that methodology because like you say it’s just promoting the appliance operators. I think on the other hand we have some really sharp people joining the ranks that are interested in new technologies and perhaps the no code licenses has opened the door for them to join the amateur ranks. They will add their expertise through computer technologies and programming rather than hardware and RF technologies. We took the approach here in Denver that if we build a D*STAR system the users will come. We organized a group and formed an non-profit corporation called Colorado D*STAR LLC. We set up committees and assigned tasks. We were lucky to live in a large metropolitan area. We were able to submit a proposal to obtain equipment on a lease as long as it was made available to all users unrestricted and without dues. Fortunately we also had a few members with deeper pockets than most willing to make it a reality. For months before we went on the air HRO couldn’t keep radios on the shelf just knowing there was going to be a repeater on the air soon. We now have a full D*STAR Stack on the air at 10,500 MSL which covers a pretty large area of North Eastern Colorado. With the gateway we can communicate to any other area with a gateway. If you were able to set up even a single band repeater on 1.2GHz with gateway in your area then at least you would be in communications with the rest of the D*STAR community world-wide (limited exception with Japan). Setting it up on 1.2GHz you would encourage other Hams to purchase the ID-1 assuming you purchased both voice repeater and data modules for 1.2GHz. A lot of the technology is happening with the software like D*RATS that runs on D*STAR. That’s where innovation will happen with the digital technology. We too hear all the complaints about how much a D*STAR radio costs but how many people that had good cell phones went out and paid over $500 to get a new iPHONE? They could have purchased a D*STAR radio for less than the iPHONE. And guess what? Only one manufacture provided the phone, much like only one manufacture is providing D*STAR currently. Others will come when they see a demand for the newer technologies. There is already a group that has developed APRS.fi which works with the iPHONE to get real time APRS tracking on the iPHONE and similar PDA’s. It’s only a matter of time that the newer technologies will catch on in amateur radio. Who knows, maybe the radio manufactures will start putting $5 GPS chips in all radios so we don’t have to spend $350 for a microphone with the chip installed! Barry KA0BBQ [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of DALE BLANCHARD Sent: Saturday, October 18, 2008 10:34 PM To: dstar digital Subject: Re: [dstar_digital] Re: Article in Popular Communications I have D-Star because I like learning about the technology but I think it will have very little use for the average Ham mentality, especially the newbee's. We still cannot get them on 220 or 6 meters. Most are on PTT 2 meters a few on 440. Took a long time to get them to discover Simplex instead of talking to next door thru a 4 state repeater.. Most hams I know do not know what all D-star will do and knock it because it cost more. Seems to be a solution for a non existent problem. My next radio will be a ID-1, so I will have another radio I can not find any one to talk to. But I get to play with the technology and talk to my self.. That is what I liked about Packet. I could link to my self thru several states and not find any one but me. But I could send packets to my self. all the way from NV to Idaho and back thru Utah. Then the Net Rom nuts took over and screwed up Hams doing it there selves. Then no one understood how it worked. Dale ----- Original Message ----- From: "Steve" < kb9mwr @yahoo.com> To: " dstar digital" < dstar _digital@ yahoogroups .com> Sent: Saturday, October 18, 2008 9:03:18 PM ( GMT-0800 ) America/ Los_Angeles Subject: [ dstar _digital] Re: Article in Popular Communications [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
