DStar Roundtable

Following the 8pm Thursday night net on Dec 14,  we had a DStar roundtable on the W4OVH 2M  DStar repeater.   This was a good opportunity to use DStar radios , find out what was happening with the repeater and make suggestions.   The following stations participated:  Jeff KM4FTK, Ken K1KDA, Ken KE2N,  Jeff KJ4MTP,  Joe KI4OHR, Bill N4SV and Mark WA4KFZ.   We saw Baofang KK4JFK on the DStar radio screen but were unable to get any audio.  We understand she is new to DStar and still configuring her radio.

The DStar repeater news was that the linking capability to reflectors has been tested and works on all DStar reflectors (REF prefix).   There are some reflectors (  DCS and XRF prefix) that it does not work on.  The technical committee is working on this.  The linking testing was spearheaded by  the two Kens – K1KDA  and KE2N.    Both W4OVH repeaters support user linking and unlinking.

Programming DStar radios has always been a challenge.   Ken K1KDA is an experienced DStar user and has programmed three radios for the DStar and other repeaters in this area.   The three radios are the ICOM 51A, 5100 and 7100.  Ken offers  images of these radios which can be used to program your radio if you have one of these models.   Contact him at k1kda2016@gmail.com.   If you are having problems programming your DStar radio,  feel free to let us know on the email reflector and someone will reach out to you.

As the roundtable progressed,  Ken K1KDA proposed that one of our DStar machine be linked to a reflector most of the time.   This would allow you to hear traffic and make QSO’s more easily.   In addition,  there are non-radio DStar devices ( hotspots and dongles) that can reach our repeater but can not perform link or unlink operations on them.  There is a Maryland, DC, Virgnia reflector (62C) that is a regional reflector.   This proposal would still allow user linking and unlinking.

If you are not registered in DStar , you can register with OVH at https://w4ovh.dstargateway.org/Dstar.do    even if you do not have a DStar radio.   You can see the current node status at https://w4ovh.dstargateway.org/

Once registered, you are registered DStar system wide and do not need to reregister on other DStar repeaters.

We plan another DStar roundtable for next month.

 

John KG4NXT

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