Thanks again to all who responded on- and off-line to this subject. Two things I learned here: There are external keyers that provide superb support for high performance contest software, but also, great software can indeed produce great CW over serial or parallel ports without the extra hardware. The lower-performing programs don’t because they use loops, timers, or other task-dependent features to send the CW.
One of my objectives is to minimize the number of cables and boxes on my desktop. If it could be made to work right, DTR/CTS keying would do the job. Here are the problems, though. First, it keys your radio when the computer reboots. This is a deal breaker for me. I’m too scatterbrained to remember to disable it when I’m not using it. Second, there’s no feedback from the radio to the software. When you touch a paddle or key, you want the software to stop sending. So two improvements are needed to make this work great: 1. An RS232 command to enable/disable DTR keying so that it’s enabled only when your contest program is running. 2. An auto-info response that sends an event to the computer when a key or paddle is touched. Then if we can get the software authors to implement it, and keep the internal keyer at the same speed as the software, I think this would work very neatly. Plug your key into the rig, the rig into the computer, and off you go. Thanks for listening! Carl WS7L K3 #486 -- View this message in context: http://www.nabble.com/-K3--Logging-programs-and-internal-keyer-tp17451428p17527515.html Sent from the Elecraft mailing list archive at Nabble.com. _______________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Post to: Elecraft@mailman.qth.net You must be a subscriber to post to the list. Subscriber Info (Addr. Change, sub, unsub etc.): http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/subscribers.htm Elecraft web page: http://www.elecraft.com