Larry wrote:
On 28 Jan 2006 20:16:11 -0800, K4YZ wrote:
Larry wrote:
On 28 Jan 2006 06:12:03 -0800, K4YZ wrote:
Greetings All,

Are any of you equipped to work the ISS crossband repeater?

Actually, you don't need crossband capability to use the ISS repeater.

Actually you do when the input is on 70 centimeters and the output
is on 2 meters. That's what "crossband" means.

Actually, I stand by my original statement: You don't NEED crossband
capability to use the ISS repeater.

At some place there is a receiver and a transmitter operating on
different bands in order to operate the ISS crossband repeater.

YOU may not have it at your "station"...However it's still
required. You're simply acting as the remote operator of someone
else's Amateur station.

I've worked MIR twice on that pair and had a blast.

I guess it's easy to "not like" if you don't have the requisite
skills or capable staion to do it with.

I made contacts through AMSAT way back in the early 70's when the
OSCAR series of the 60's was being continued. It boiled down to being
a novelty activity for hams, but one which only imitated what
communications engineers and other professionals had pioneered long
before hams used a satellite. In fact, most OSCAR satellites were
stuffed into the unused space in government launch vehicles and were
essentially CARE packages from those who were doing the real
pioneering work.

Which does not speak to your station NOW. Since you do not
include a callsign, all I can do is "assume" that this is a bit of
blustery buffoonery by Lennie the Licenseless or someone like him
quoting the works of others. I see a lot of that "professional
engineers are better than hams" rhetoric there.

Nope, I say the VoIP Echolink or IRLP method is much more reliable.

Perhaps it is. And if that's what spins your propeller, more power
to you. But making a "contact" via Echolink is no more challenging
that turning the light on when you enter a room.

I see. And I suppose that, when you decide to cross a river, you
eschew the nearby bridges in favor of swimming across instead. Do you
also use a horse instead of choosing to own a car?

Nope. But then neither of them is "radio". I am a licensed
Amateur RADIO operator because I enjoy operating RADIOS.

If I were an Olympic swimmer I just might cross that river IN it
rather than over it, and if I were Amish, I'd use that horse to get
around rather than a car.

Some can say that about FM, or SSB, or CW, or any other mode.
However anyone can turn the computer on and work Echolink. There's no
skill in that.

Anyone can turn on a transceiver and push a button. There's no real
skill in that either.

OK.

Just turn on a radio and push a button. Any button.

Talk to anyone without selecting the right frequency, split, mode,
antenna, etc etc etc ...?!?!

Or does it take a bit of knowledge and skill to get that radio
working into a proper antenna, on the proper frequency to actually make
that contact...?!?!

Did you make your alleged OSCAR contacts by just "pushing a
button", or did you have to know a bit about Kleperian tables, AOS/LOS
schedules, polarization techniques, Doppler effect...?!?!

But there *is* skill in figuring out optimal voice sampling and
compression techniques, combining them with the optimal IP protocol
(UDP/IP), and then writing and installing VoIP software to accomplish
that end, followed by setting up servers and repeaters to support it.
In fact, I submit that the hams who embraced the Internet and
developed those methods are among the most technically skilled members
of the amateur community.

I submit that there is a whole flock of guys out thre who just
down loaded the software and got on the computer when they were told
to. I know of at least 2 or three locally who have done exactly that.

If all you do is push a button, then you're an appliance operator in
my estimation.

Judging by the foregoing statements, I'd say you're probably not a
licensed Amateur and are just pulling rabbits out of someone else's
hat. And as for applicance operators, who built YOUR computer...?!?!

Steve, K4YZ