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Digital Modes Overview

This document provides a high-level overview of several amateur digital modes, including BPSK31, RTTY, Packet, APRS, and Winlink 2000. It discusses the minimum equipment needed, including a computer with a sound card, radio with VHF and/or HF capabilities, interface, and software. Various digital modes and interfaces are described, along with tips on operating digital modes with low audio levels to avoid interference. Resources like the ARRL and Wikipedia are also listed for further information.

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Benjamin Dover
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129 views

Digital Modes Overview

This document provides a high-level overview of several amateur digital modes, including BPSK31, RTTY, Packet, APRS, and Winlink 2000. It discusses the minimum equipment needed, including a computer with a sound card, radio with VHF and/or HF capabilities, interface, and software. Various digital modes and interfaces are described, along with tips on operating digital modes with low audio levels to avoid interference. Resources like the ARRL and Wikipedia are also listed for further information.

Uploaded by

Benjamin Dover
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Digital Modes Presentation

A high level overview of several amateur digital modes

BPSK 31
RTTY
Packet
APRS
Winlink 2000
NR4J Mark
Minimum equipment:

Computer with sound card and USB or serial port


Radio, VHF and or HF
Interface
Software
CW - The first digital
mode
Morse code is the original digital mode
Get your feet wet today by going to w4ax.com . The web site is an SDR, software defined
radio. All you need might be a stereo mini cable to be copying and decoding digital signals. If
you have radio equipment you can use the same stereo mini cable from the external speaker
jack of your rig to the sound card on your computer

Key points: less is more. Digital modes dont do well cranked wide open. Much less
audio to the radio is needed for good performance with minimum interference to other
operators.

If you think its enough its probably a little too much. Other operators can help you adjust
your signal or use w4ax.com to get a better idea how you are operating.
Types of
Homebrew
Interfaces
RIGblaster Duo
Software defined
interface
No jumpers to change. No power supply needed.
Computer assisted transceiver built in.
WB9JFR interface
Built in
interface
Binary Phase Shift Keying
BPSK (also called 2PSK) is the simplest form of phase shift keying (PSK). It
uses two phases which are separated by 180 and so can also be termed 2-PSK.
In this figure the constellation points are shown on the axis, at 0 and 180. This
modulation is the most robust of all the PSKs since it takes the highest level of
noise or distortion to make the demodulator reach an incorrect decision. It is,
however, only able to modulate at 1 bit/symbol (as seen in the figure) and so is
unsuitable for high data-rate applications.
Quadrature phase-shift keying
(QPSK)
Sometimes this is known as quaternary PSK, quadriphase PSK, 4-PSK, or 4-QAM.
QPSK uses four points on the constellation diagram, equispaced around a circle. With
four phases, QPSK can encode two bits per symbol, shown in the diagram with gray
coding to minimize the bit error rate (BER) sometimes misperceived as twice the
BER of BPSK.
The mathematical analysis shows that QPSK can be used either to double the data rate
compared with a BPSK system while maintaining the same bandwidth of the signal, or to
maintain the data-rate of BPSK but halving the bandwidth needed. In this latter case, the
BER of QPSK is exactly the same as the BER of BPSK .
I worked a guy on 20M psk31 and he was holding his mic up to his computer speaker.
Not a good idea. If your dog starts barking you have just put a 2.5 kHz wide ssb signal in
the cw/digital portion of the band

Digital mode advantages: free station for field day, each qso worth twice the points of a
phone contact.

remote into your home shack and run digital modes with Teamviewer
JT65 program was initially written by Joe Taylor, K1JT
JT65B is optimized for moon bounce (EME)
JT65A is for terrestrial contacts
Other modes gaining popularity are:
WSPR or whisper

Keying rate: 12000/8192 = 1.4648 baud. Modulation: continuous


phase 4-FSK, tone separation 1.4648 Hz. Occupied bandwidth:
about 6 Hz
Duration of transmission: 162 * 8192/12000 = 110.6 s.
Minimum S/N for reception: around 28 dB on the WSJT scale

JT65is optimized for terrestrial contacts. developed and released


in late 2003, is intended for extremely weak but slowly-varying
signals, such as those found on troposcatter or Earth-Moon-Earth
(EME, or "moonbounce") paths
APRS frequency 144.39 MHz FM 1200 baud packet(AFSK) On 30 meters, 300 baud
packet, Worldwide. HF APRS packet is on USB Dial Frequency 10.147.600 MHz for boats
and RV's not near a VHF digipeater.

Winlink 2000 is a way to send and receive email when no internet connection is
available. Also usable by boats and RV's not near an internet connection or a VHF
packet network.
Winlink needs accompanying programs installed

Winmor TNC - sound card TNC emulator


Itshfbc - HF prediction program
RMS Express - Email client
RMS Express
Winlink
2000
Resources

ARRL
Almost every issue of QST magazine has an article or hint about operating a digital mode.
Members have access to archived issues and are able to search and download individual
articles.

http://www.arrl.org/digital-modes

Wikipedia
Has numerous pages on modes, technical specifications
Questions?

If I dont know the answer, Ill make something up!

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