Dan Maloney has a summary of the development of the BNC connector at Hackaday. The connector that would eventually become known as the BNC connector when it was invented in the 1950s has its roots in two separate connectors developed in the 1930s and 1940s for the burgeoning radio and telephone industries. … Salati’s connector […]
John Bee, N1GNV, of Quicksilver Radio Products sent a Christmas greeting that contains good advice for the Amateur Radio enthusiast and some ideas everyone should think about for making and enjoying happy and prosperous I just want to take a minute to wish you and yours the very best for the Holiday Season. May it be […]
Here’s another notice of the ARRL annual report by Jenny List at Hackaday: Amateur Radio Just Isn’t Exciting. She adds to the list of suggestions. There are more than 100 comments on the post. As ARRL president, [Rick Roderick, K5UR] spends a significant amount of time proselytising the hobby. He has a standard talk about […]
The ARRL released its annual report and KB6NU provides an interesting commentary: ARRL annual report touts achievements, downplays membership – On a related topic, ARRL president, Rick Roderick, K5UR, in his message, tells the story of how his stump speech to a group of high school students about ham radio fell on deaf ears. He writes, […]
Retro Radio: W8CDX Takes Field Day Back to its Roots – “Some younger radio amateurs may not realize that ARRL Field Day has been a staple operating event for more than 80 years.” “We had a lot of fun putting up another 1930s-style station for Field Day 2017,” said Eric Tichansky, NO3M, the trustee of […]
There’s a simple eighth inch jack on the back of most Icom radios that provides a communication interface for control purposes. If you look around for how to tie this into a computer, most of what you’ll find is about converting to a standard RS-232 serial port. That is soooo old tech! I like what Guy […]
You’d think Amateur Radio and FOSS devotees would be sympatico but, alas, most hams are appliance operators and this means Windows and commercial software. That goes back to Bill Gates’ famous letter about piracy of his intellectual property and the evolution about software licensing, ownership, and business models. Ham Radio Deluxe (HRD) just hit a […]
Back in the day, a short wave radio with a decent antenna was needed if you wanted to listen to foreign broadcast stations. Now all you need is a computer connected to the I’net. Radio Garden provides a globe you can scroll with green dots for radio stations. Click on a green dot or scroll […]
The Hobbyist’s Guide to the RTL-SDR: Really Cheap Software Defined Radio (affiliate link) by Mr. Carl Laufer is a compendium and compilation that makes it a good reference and an eye opener about what you can do with the inexpensive TV dongles based on the RTL2832U for modern short wave listening. One aspect is software […]
I’ve seen several reports from hams who have tested the FSQ “digital chat mode” described in the September 2015 edition of QST. That illustrates just how easy it is to implement a new digital mode with a modern Amateur Radio station. The article also provides an example of just how hams can experiment with new […]