It’s easier3 to program a radio for D-STAR than it is a standard FM repeater with tone.
D-STAR – Set frequency, set mode, set offset, kerchunk and hit one-touch1 FM – Set frequency, set mode, set offset, set tone2, turn tone on Ed WA4YIH 1 In the interest of full disclosure. If you kerchunk and set the one-touch, you will be able to talk, but the RPT2 gateway will not be set. If you hit the one touch while someone else is talking, the RPT2 gateway will get set. If the RPT2 gateway is not set, changing one character in a callsign is a simple procedure that takes about 5 seconds. 2In the continued full disclosure, if you don’t know the tone, there isn’t a really great way of figuring it out. You could attempt to kerchunk with each tone until you find it, but many repeaters have anti-kerchunk features which make this time consuming and marginally reliable. If the repeater is transmitting and your radio has auto-tone decode functionality, you can use this to determine the transmitted tone and hope that it is the same as the received tone. 3Many people can’t program their radios from the keyboard for an FM repeater. So for some, this is a moot argument. It helps to actually understand what a repeater’s frequency, offset, mode, and tone are, but again, not everyone knows. For these “appliance operators” preprogrammed memories like Mark’s are a mechanism to simplify something that could be dramatically simplified. A consensus opinion could easily have a mechanism that would allow preprogrammed radios work worldwide. But oh yeah, that would require a consensus opinion just like Open Source Development would! ☺ From: dstar_digital@yahoogroups.com [mailto:dstar_digi...@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Chris Fowler Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2010 3:40 PM To: dstar_digital@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [DSTAR_DIGITAL] Re: Alternative D-STAR Equipment On Wed, 2010-03-17 at 12:30 -0700, J. Moen wrote: The one thing I hate is using memories to do everything. Go to a new area and you've got to program new memories. Ever see one of Mark's , KJ4VO, files? He has everything in there. I get confused just looking at one.
