Re: [digitalradio] Comparing data modes
DM780 samples at 8kHz and has a lot of encoder / decoder code in common with fldigi. MT63 / Olivia having being taken from Pavel's original code. I'll try to find the Microsoft Blog entries which explain why some rates such as 11,025Hz are so poor with W2K / XP but not with VISTA. It's not a compromise - anyway with luck I'll find this explanation this morning. FWIW I generate 8kHz from 48kHz sampling using Moe's code. Simon Brown, HB9DRV www.ham-radio-deluxe.com - Original Message - From: Dave AA6YQ Also, there is no reason to believe that the two applications would be equally penalized by a compromise sampling rate -- so the results of the comparison would be suspect unless its known that both applications use the same sampling rate. -Original Message- From: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Dave AA6YQ Its my understanding that when multiple simultaneously running applications are using the soundcard with different sampling rates, that Windows delivers a compromise sampling rate. Thus comparisons run on the same PC may not accurately reflect each application's performance in isolation.
Re: [digitalradio] Comparing data modes
I'm sure fldigi uses 8kHz in general and 11,025 when needed for some Thor / DominoEx modes. Simon Brown, HB9DRV www.ham-radio-deluxe.com - Original Message - The sample rates were 11025 Hz for Mixw and IZ8BLY MT63 terminal. Looks like 8000 Hz for DM780 and Multipsk. Not sure what's going on with Fldigi. I'm using the Vista version.
Re: [digitalradio] Sound card and Vista
I have had no problems with Vista and sound card programs Lew - Original Message - From: Tony To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Tuesday, September 30, 2008 12:19 AM Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Sound card and Vista Bert, I am in the market for a new laptop that will be use for ham radio software such as PSK 31. I been told that Vista OS may not work with the sound card programs. KD7Jeh Bert Had some trouble with the digital voice program FDMDV. All was fine after the author modified the program for Vista. Everything else works fine. Good luck with your new machine... Tony, K2MO - Original Message - From: kd7jeh [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Monday, September 29, 2008 10:35 PM Subject: [digitalradio] Sound card and Vista Hello to the group, I am in the market for a new laptop that will be use for ham radio software such as PSK 31. I been told that Vista OS may not work with the sound card programs. Is this true? I would like to hear from you Vista owners good and bad. I would like to know what laptop brand your using. Thanks KD7Jeh Bert
[digitalradio] Sound Card general question
Can anyone tell me just how much (or little) sound card calibration affects PSK and RTTY reception? Here's my reason for asking: When I got my current sound card, the first thing I did was to run the various calibration routines from MMTTY, DM780, and MultiPSK. These calibration routines showed the card was off by 181 parts-per- million. I set up the various software accordingly and all was well. I just started noticing reception problems, primarily on RTTY and ran another set of calibrations. This time, results showed the card off by 6984 parts-per-million. The size of the error doesn't worry me too much, as it is still under 1%, and I can only assume (hope?) that the calibration changed as the card burned in. Going to monitor it closely to see if it changes any more over time. Could this much of an error cause trouble decoding RTTY signals if not compensated for in the software? Even with a strong signal I was losing quite a bit of text, although PSK decoding seemed to be totally unaffected. Thanks in advance 73 Dave KB3MOW
Re: [digitalradio] Sound Card general question
- Original Message - From: Dave [EMAIL PROTECTED] When I got my current sound card, the first thing I did was to run the various calibration routines from MMTTY, DM780, and MultiPSK. These calibration routines showed the card was off by 181 parts-per- million. I set up the various software accordingly and all was well. This offset shouldn't really have a big affect - I would be wondering about squelch levels or even the soundcard. What is the soundcard? Internal or external? RTTY is nowhere near as good as PSK when it comes to weak signals. I've encountered someone with a soundcard running in surround mode :-( Simon Brown, HB9DRV www.ham-radio-deluxe.com
Re: [digitalradio] Re: RTTY: Some new ones I mopped up this weekend
John Becker wrote: After almost 50 years as a ham, I just got on RTTY within the last month. I decided to get in the contest over the weekend to get a little experience operating RTTY in pileup situations. Before the contest I had worked 16 countries on RTTY. At the end of the contest I had 75. I made 167 contest QSOs on 40, 20 and 15. What a blast! 73, John, K9MM What software and/or hardware did you use? I've used both MMTTY and MixW. It seems much easier to tune with MixW since you can see much more of the band and any signals present. Tim, N9PUZ
[digitalradio] TARA PSK31 RUMBLE THIS WEEKEND!!!
TARA RUMBLE THIS WEEKEND!!! Posted by: w7psk [EMAIL PROTECTED] w7psk Date: Mon Sep 29, 2008 8:40 am ((PDT)) 00:00 UTC through 24:00 UTC - 4 October 2008 The fall classic, the original PSK31 contest is THIS WEEKEND. So get get things together. ALSO, NOW is when you should be getting your teams in for the team Challenge. LETS GET READY TO RUMBLE !!! Rumble Page http://www.n2ty.org/seasons/tara_rumble_rules.html TEAM CHALLENGE PAGE http://www.n2ty.org/seasons/tara_rumble_club.html Hope to see you there W7PSK Scotty Rumble Manager
RE: [digitalradio] Comparing data modes
Stelios's note raises another point independent of sampling rate issues: when running more than one digital mode app on the same processor, one or both apps may be starved for CPU cycles and as a result underperform. Given all the unknowns, I wouldn't consider a comparison between two digital mode applications to be apples and apples unless the test was accomplished on two identically configured PCs, each processing the same data stream. If the data stream can be recorded and replayed, then of course the tests can be run serially on a single PC. 73, Dave, AA6YQ -Original Message- From: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Stelios Bounanos Sent: Tuesday, September 30, 2008 9:03 AM To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Cc: Tony Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Comparing data modes On Tue, 30 Sep 2008 00:04:19 -0400, Tony [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: What were the sampling rates used by each of those 5 applications, Tony? 73, Dave, AA6YQ The sample rates were 11025 Hz for Mixw and IZ8BLY MT63 terminal. Looks like 8000 Hz for DM780 and Multipsk. Not sure what's going on with Fldigi. I'm using the Vista version. The MT63 modem works at 8000 Hz as Simon noted. However, fldigi's default behaviour is to open the sound card at its default (native) sample rate, usually 48 or 44.1 KHz, and then resample to/from the modem rate using one of the converters from Erik de Castro Lopo's excellent libsamplerate. The converter is chosen based on a short speed test that is done the first time fldigi is run. On all reasonably recent processors, that converter will be one of the good SINC interpolators. It can always be changed later. We basically did this to avoid the not too uncommon situation where a sound card/driver combination claims to support the modem's sample rate only to return mangled audio. To really open the sound card at the modem frequency, which is currently 11025 Hz for Thor and DominoEX 5/11/22, and 8000 Hz for everything else, use the Capture and Playback menus in the Audio settings. The default value is Native (see above). Auto will try the modem rate first and, if that fails, fall back to Native. You may want to try Auto if you know that the OS can do better/faster resampling. The other options in those menus are the rates supposedly supported by the sound card. I say supposedly because the driver may be telling some slight fibs here, i.e., if it reports the hardware native rates together with those that it can resample to in software. It's almost certainly doing that if it lists every standard rate from 8KHz up to 192KHz. Experience suggests that we can trust the default (native) sample rate, at least on the cards and platforms tested so far. The other rates give audio of uncertain quality. Anyway, if you force a rate that is different to the current modem's, fldigi will need to resample. It will also resample, using the same configured conveter, if the TX or RX ppm corrections are nonzero. Of course it's smart enough to combine both kinds of resampling into one step. I don't know enough about Vista's audio system to be able to say what happens if you run multiple programs that want different rates. Possibly some of them will see slightly increased latency. Regarding CPU usage, you should make sure that you have enough CPU cycles for everything; maybe aim to keep the system load at 50%. Fldigi can tell you if it's dropping audio because the CPU is too busy but only in debug builds; perhaps something to change in a future version. 73, Stelios, M0GLD.
Re: [digitalradio] Sound card and Vista
Hello Mark, touch anything at all while running the program, it mutes my line in. Strange. Fldigi seems to work fine You must have chosen the Software adjustment in the Mixer menu of the Configuration screen (the Line in is muted in the mixer Volume menu but, of course not, in the mixer Recording menu). So switch to User adjustment. 73 Patrick - Original Message - From: Mark Milburn [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Tuesday, September 30, 2008 3:47 PM Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Sound card and Vista Works with some and not well with others. MixW works just fine for me, MultiPSK doesn't work well. If I touch anything at all while running the program, it mutes my line in. Strange. Fldigi seems to work fine but I haven't given it much of a workout yet. 73 Mark --- Lew Cason [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I have had no problems with Vista and sound card programs Lew - Original Message - From: Tony To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Tuesday, September 30, 2008 12:19 AM Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Sound card and Vista Bert, I am in the market for a new laptop that will be use for ham radio software such as PSK 31. I been told that Vista OS may not work with the sound card programs. KD7Jeh Bert Had some trouble with the digital voice program FDMDV. All was fine after the author modified the program for Vista. Everything else works fine. Good luck with your new machine... Tony, K2MO - Original Message - From: kd7jeh [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Monday, September 29, 2008 10:35 PM Subject: [digitalradio] Sound card and Vista Hello to the group, I am in the market for a new laptop that will be use for ham radio software such as PSK 31. I been told that Vista OS may not work with the sound card programs. Is this true? I would like to hear from you Vista owners good and bad. I would like to know what laptop brand your using. Thanks KD7Jeh Bert Announce your digital presence via our Interactive Sked Page at http://www.obriensweb.com/sked 30M digital activity at http://www.projectsandparts.com/30m Recommended software : DM780, Multipsk, FLDIGI, Winwarbler ,MMVARI. Yahoo! Groups Links
Re: [digitalradio] Comparing data modes
Hello Stelios, However, fldigi's default behaviour is to open the sound card at its default (native) sample rate, usually 48 or 44.1 KHz, and then resample But how can you know the default native sample rate? With Multidem, I can work in full duplex in any sampling speed from 8000 to 192000 Hz. I have noticed that you can open a 44.1 KHz at 48 KHz native sample rate sound card and reversely (the driver accepts all included 192 KHz). Of course, by working in full duplex, you rapidly see what is the true native sample rate (there are no clicks if you are on the good one and you can regulate the possible small shift between RX and TX sample rates). 73 Patrick - Original Message - From: Stelios Bounanos [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Cc: Tony [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, September 30, 2008 3:03 PM Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Comparing data modes On Tue, 30 Sep 2008 00:04:19 -0400, Tony [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: What were the sampling rates used by each of those 5 applications, Tony? 73, Dave, AA6YQ The sample rates were 11025 Hz for Mixw and IZ8BLY MT63 terminal. Looks like 8000 Hz for DM780 and Multipsk. Not sure what's going on with Fldigi. I'm using the Vista version. The MT63 modem works at 8000 Hz as Simon noted. However, fldigi's default behaviour is to open the sound card at its default (native) sample rate, usually 48 or 44.1 KHz, and then resample to/from the modem rate using one of the converters from Erik de Castro Lopo's excellent libsamplerate. The converter is chosen based on a short speed test that is done the first time fldigi is run. On all reasonably recent processors, that converter will be one of the good SINC interpolators. It can always be changed later. We basically did this to avoid the not too uncommon situation where a sound card/driver combination claims to support the modem's sample rate only to return mangled audio. To really open the sound card at the modem frequency, which is currently 11025 Hz for Thor and DominoEX 5/11/22, and 8000 Hz for everything else, use the Capture and Playback menus in the Audio settings. The default value is Native (see above). Auto will try the modem rate first and, if that fails, fall back to Native. You may want to try Auto if you know that the OS can do better/faster resampling. The other options in those menus are the rates supposedly supported by the sound card. I say supposedly because the driver may be telling some slight fibs here, i.e., if it reports the hardware native rates together with those that it can resample to in software. It's almost certainly doing that if it lists every standard rate from 8KHz up to 192KHz. Experience suggests that we can trust the default (native) sample rate, at least on the cards and platforms tested so far. The other rates give audio of uncertain quality. Anyway, if you force a rate that is different to the current modem's, fldigi will need to resample. It will also resample, using the same configured conveter, if the TX or RX ppm corrections are nonzero. Of course it's smart enough to combine both kinds of resampling into one step. I don't know enough about Vista's audio system to be able to say what happens if you run multiple programs that want different rates. Possibly some of them will see slightly increased latency. Regarding CPU usage, you should make sure that you have enough CPU cycles for everything; maybe aim to keep the system load at 50%. Fldigi can tell you if it's dropping audio because the CPU is too busy but only in debug builds; perhaps something to change in a future version. 73, Stelios, M0GLD. Announce your digital presence via our Interactive Sked Page at http://www.obriensweb.com/sked 30M digital activity at http://www.projectsandparts.com/30m Recommended software : DM780, Multipsk, FLDIGI, Winwarbler ,MMVARI. Yahoo! Groups Links
Re: [digitalradio] Sound Card general question
Hello Dave, As Simon says, the RTTY is very few sensitive to sampling rate as it is not a synchronous mode as PSK31. It means that the decoding is more or less done as CW. The decoding program has not to synchronize to the signal (to extract the exact moment when it will have to assess the bit value). RTTY is sensitive to the shift (170 or 200 Hz, as they are both used, 170 Hz being the most common) and the S/N ratio which must be good. If all is OK and if you XCVR is stable, there is no normally specific problem. 73 Patrick - Original Message - From: Dave [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Tuesday, September 30, 2008 4:34 PM Subject: [digitalradio] Sound Card general question Can anyone tell me just how much (or little) sound card calibration affects PSK and RTTY reception? Here's my reason for asking: When I got my current sound card, the first thing I did was to run the various calibration routines from MMTTY, DM780, and MultiPSK. These calibration routines showed the card was off by 181 parts-per- million. I set up the various software accordingly and all was well. I just started noticing reception problems, primarily on RTTY and ran another set of calibrations. This time, results showed the card off by 6984 parts-per-million. The size of the error doesn't worry me too much, as it is still under 1%, and I can only assume (hope?) that the calibration changed as the card burned in. Going to monitor it closely to see if it changes any more over time. Could this much of an error cause trouble decoding RTTY signals if not compensated for in the software? Even with a strong signal I was losing quite a bit of text, although PSK decoding seemed to be totally unaffected. Thanks in advance 73 Dave KB3MOW Announce your digital presence via our Interactive Sked Page at http://www.obriensweb.com/sked 30M digital activity at http://www.projectsandparts.com/30m Recommended software : DM780, Multipsk, FLDIGI, Winwarbler ,MMVARI. Yahoo! Groups Links
Re: [digitalradio] Sound Card general question
What is a good program to check the sound card with? I had not as yet check this sound card.
Re: [digitalradio] Sound Card general question
Hello John, I think that with any program, you can check the sample rate calibration. In Multipsk, click on the button Sampling freq.. You have automatic determination of RX and TX sampling rates at 11025 samples/s. You have also a test for MT63 (at 8000 samples/s). 73 Patrick Original Message - From: John Becker, WØJAB [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Tuesday, September 30, 2008 9:55 PM Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Sound Card general question What is a good program to check the sound card with? I had not as yet check this sound card. Announce your digital presence via our Interactive Sked Page at http://www.obriensweb.com/sked 30M digital activity at http://www.projectsandparts.com/30m Recommended software : DM780, Multipsk, FLDIGI, Winwarbler ,MMVARI. Yahoo! Groups Links
Re: [digitalradio] Sound card and Vista
I guess that was it it...seems to work fine now, Patrick. I would have sworn I tried all that before, but evidently not. Thanks for the help. I love your program. 73 Mark --- Patrick Lindecker [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hello Mark, touch anything at all while running the program, it mutes my line in. Strange. Fldigi seems to work fine You must have chosen the Software adjustment in the Mixer menu of the Configuration screen (the Line in is muted in the mixer Volume menu but, of course not, in the mixer Recording menu). So switch to User adjustment. 73 Patrick - Original Message - From: Mark Milburn [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Tuesday, September 30, 2008 3:47 PM Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Sound card and Vista Works with some and not well with others. MixW works just fine for me, MultiPSK doesn't work well. If I touch anything at all while running the program, it mutes my line in. Strange. Fldigi seems to work fine but I haven't given it much of a workout yet. 73 Mark --- Lew Cason [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I have had no problems with Vista and sound card programs Lew - Original Message - From: Tony To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Tuesday, September 30, 2008 12:19 AM Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Sound card and Vista Bert, I am in the market for a new laptop that will be use for ham radio software such as PSK 31. I been told that Vista OS may not work with the sound card programs. KD7Jeh Bert Had some trouble with the digital voice program FDMDV. All was fine after the author modified the program for Vista. Everything else works fine. Good luck with your new machine... Tony, K2MO - Original Message - From: kd7jeh [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Monday, September 29, 2008 10:35 PM Subject: [digitalradio] Sound card and Vista Hello to the group, I am in the market for a new laptop that will be use for ham radio software such as PSK 31. I been told that Vista OS may not work with the sound card programs. Is this true? I would like to hear from you Vista owners good and bad. I would like to know what laptop brand your using. Thanks KD7Jeh Bert Announce your digital presence via our Interactive Sked Page at http://www.obriensweb.com/sked 30M digital activity at http://www.projectsandparts.com/30m Recommended software : DM780, Multipsk, FLDIGI, Winwarbler ,MMVARI. Yahoo! Groups Links Announce your digital presence via our Interactive Sked Page at http://www.obriensweb.com/sked 30M digital activity at http://www.projectsandparts.com/30m Recommended software : DM780, Multipsk, FLDIGI, Winwarbler ,MMVARI. Yahoo! Groups Links
[digitalradio] EA3AQS CQ MT63 - 14109.0
All, EA3AQS CQ'ing on MT63 - 14109.0 @ 2100z. Tony, K2MO
[digitalradio] MT63 - 14106.0
Sitting on 14106.0 1Kc long
Re: [digitalradio] Comparing data modes
Hello Tony, The sample rate on Multipsk is 11025 samples/s for all modes except in MT63 where it is 8000. 73 Patrick Thanks for the info Patrick. Tony, K2MO - Original Message - From: Patrick Lindecker [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Tuesday, September 30, 2008 2:59 PM Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Comparing data modes Hello Tony, The sample rate on Multipsk is 11025 samples/s for all modes except in MT63 where it is 8000. 73 Patrick - Original Message - From: Tony [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitalradio@yahoogroups.com Sent: Tuesday, September 30, 2008 6:04 AM Subject: Re: [digitalradio] Comparing data modes What were the sampling rates used by each of those 5 applications, Tony? 73, Dave, AA6YQ Dave, The sample rates were 11025 Hz for Mixw and IZ8BLY MT63 terminal. Looks like 8000 Hz for DM780 and Multipsk. Not sure what's going on with Fldigi. I'm using the Vista version. Tony, K2MO Announce your digital presence via our Interactive Sked Page at http://www.obriensweb.com/sked 30M digital activity at http://www.projectsandparts.com/30m Recommended software : DM780, Multipsk, FLDIGI, Winwarbler ,MMVARI. Yahoo! Groups Links
Re: [digitalradio] Airlink Express version 1.5.1.222 is available for download
Just a mention here that I ave seen several favourable reviews of this new application. Just downloaded it tonight, very nice. Andy K3UK On Mon, Aug 18, 2008 at 7:26 AM, whynotbecreative [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hi there, An update to Airlink Express is now available at: http://www.airlinkexpress.org Version 1.5.1.222 is compatible with USB based soundcard interfaces like the Signalink USB and Digikeyer, and is also made backward compatible with Windows 98 and ME. It also offers many new features: - CAT support for Icom and some Yaesu radios (confirmed: IC-756ProIII, IC-718, IC-275H, FT-897) - Center PassBand (Align) Tuning - RTTY FSK keying through serial port (only through real serial ports) RTS = PTT, TxD = FSK signal - automatic grabbing of callsigns from received text - keyboard shortcuts - clear filters button to the toolbar - auto repeat capability to every macro button - capability to change fonts for the Rx and Tx window - capability to change the background and text color in the Rx and Tx Window - various new macro tags Please read the help file to become familiar with the new features. The installer offers the option to upgrade. If you choose to do so, please make a backup of your log before you upgrade to the latest version. To do this, export the log to an ADIF file (under the File menu option). This will be your backup. Then go ahead and install the latest version with the upgrade option. All macros, settings and the log should be preserved and will be migrated to the new version. I rarely am able to read the Yahoo forums, so please contact me directly if you encounter any problems, have any questions, comments or suggestions. Thank you for your time and 73, --Alex KR1ST http://www.airlinkexpress.org http://www.kr1st.com -- Andy K3UK
