Posted 22 Jul 2009 — by Alex
Category Radio
WSPR = Whisper
Joe Taylor and people like him never cease to amaze me. Without trying to state the obvious he really is a clever bloke. I’ve used WSJT a few times, mostly for receiving but on a couple of occasions I’ve done a small amount of transmitting. I’d seen WSPR on his website and if the truth be told I had too much on my plate to think about using it. Now I’ve got some semblance of normality back and the sporadic E season starts to wane. I was thinking of my long ‘un’established sdr beacon receiver then the idea struck me.
WSPR + Softrock HF Lite + Atom motherboard = WSPR receiver
Why change from Faros. We’ll its no change for the long term but I’ve still not been able to find a way to use the HF lite with Faros for all the IARU HF beacons. Something that it really frustrating. If only I had the ability to write software!
So the possible change in direction needs a bit of thought. Is it worth while? I’m running it for a few days to see what it gives me. Sounds like the project could be something big if enough get involved.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 — by Alex
Category Radio
Have there been some sunspots or something?
All of a sudden over the last few days the Faros station has started reporting some signals. After being quiet for a number of weeks with little spotting going on something has happened to spurn it into action, Good news anyway. I might have to get the HF vertical out this evening and put the 6m Yagi to bed until next season.
As a bit of a geek its easy to get drawn into new and shiny things. I’ve never really been an Apple fan, mainly because many of the products are similar to others that exist but with a more sparkly box or they are just over priced. Looking at the iPhone you can’t help but think that they are nice, but as a pay as you go kind of person I wasn’t going to fork out over £500 for a phone. Equally I’ve seen a fair few broken screens that have ended up costing the owners a lot of frustration as well as money to get fixed.
So what to get, I’m still happy with windows mobile as well, my Axim x50v served me well but it wasn’t a phone, replacing that with an HTC of sorts still meant shelling out quite a lot more than I was prepared to. So I plumped for a blackberry Storm, second hand on eBay. Always a risk but worth a punt.
After getting hold of one for a reasonable price and a few hassles with the email as it was still locked to the previous owner I’ve managed to get my email on it and a few of the apps that I used constantly with my Axim and hey presto a single device with a phone, push email, camera, gps all in one.
The gps proved useful on a trip to Glasgow where I needed to find a restaurant and the Google maps app got me there in a heartbeat, shame it isn’t turn by turn (Blackberry maps doesn’t seem to work with Orange and Vodafone doesn’t work in my house!).
So, for those who don’t do Apple I can heartily recommend it. I don’t need a spirit level or baby shaking application so it seems as though its been a very useful purchase.
