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Old 01-01-2012, 09:56 PM
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Jeffhs Jeffhs is offline
<----Zenith C845
 
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: Fairport Harbor, Ohio (near Lake Erie)
Posts: 4,035
If you are in a situation (e. g. if you live in an apartment building, as I do) in which you cannot erect outdoor antennas for an amateur station, one solution is Echolink. This is a program that allows you to contact other amateurs via VoIP, or Voice over Internet Protocol. It is not a glorified chat room; it is a system that allows licensed amateurs to connect to actual amateur stations in real time, just as if they were communicating via the amateur airwaves. Echolink requires no outdoor antennas and will work with any computer running at least Windows 98 or Win98SE, although for best results Win XP or higher is preferred. I have successfully run Echolink on an old Win98SE system, and presently use the program on my Windows XP box; needless to say, the software runs much faster and smoother on the latter system, and it also allows me to use EQ-100, an Echolink add-on that, among other things, gives the software the look and feel of a hardware HF amateur transceiver.

The Echolink software is available as a 100 percent free download at www.echolink.org. The EQ-100 addon is optional and is not necessary to allow the Echolink software to operate properly. The download link for this addon is available at www.hfremote.us. However, to get started with Echolink, the EL software and a microphone (plus your computer, of course) are all that's necessary.

Note that Echolink is intended for voice operation only, not CW or any other mode authorized to amateurs. If you want to operate CW using your computer, use VE3EFC's CQ-100 software. This software will allow use of CW via your keyboard and is also a free download at www.qsonet.com. However, unlike Echolink, CQ-100 is little more than a glorified chat room for use only by licensed amateurs, and it requires a $34 annual fee to access its servers. Echolink, on the other hand, is 100 percent free, no strings attached.

Some amateurs are dead-set against anything having to do with communications systems that are not RF-based ("if it doesn't use radio waves, it's not amateur radio") and will not have a thing to do with Echolink; I must admit that I was once of that mindset myself, until I realized that EL would allow me to get back into ham radio in much the same manner as I was involved in the hobby back at my former home. I operated mostly CW in those days (June 1972-November 1999) from my 100-watt station in a small Cleveland suburb, worked 49 states and a handful of foreign countries, but when I found out I would have to move I thought my hamming days had ended for good. I was able to remain active after a fashion on 2-meter FM (I'm a member of a local radio club, the Lake County Amateur Radio Association of Painesville, Ohio, near Cleveland) after I moved here, but I missed operating HF, so I was very glad to find out, some years later, about Echolink. My EL node number appears after my profile signature.

73,
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Jeff, WB8NHV

Collecting, restoring and enjoying vintage Zenith radios since 2002

Zenith. Gone, but not forgotten.
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