[amsat-bb] Re: ISS Packet activity? I'm having problems and getting frustrated

[Michael Tondee]

I don't use squelch at all and I've adjusted the audio level to what I 
think is acceptable with the built in sound card tuning utility in 
AGWPE. I can't answer the QRN question completely except to say that 
I've never noticed a problem with terrestrial packet but it has been 
awhile since I've done that. My computer is a Pentium IV 2.4 Ghz.  with 
1 GB of Ram.
After I got the small packet that I did decode I haven't heard much else 
so I'll have to check the suggested sites for activity logs.
BTW, hope this isn't a stupid question but what is this...  0130:32T 
W4HIJ>APU25N Port=1 <UI C LEN=30>  Then I see what appears to be my 
latitude and longtitude afterwards. I t comes up in my UIView terminal 
window on a pretty regular basis.
Tnx for the help guys and 73,
Michael, W4HIJ
Joe Veldhuis wrote:
> Is your radio's squelch on? If it doesn't open fast enough, the beginning of the packet will be cut off and thus it won't decode. It's best to run with open squelch.
>
> Is your RX audio level too low or too high? Is there noise or hum in the audio? Any of these will make decoding any packet signal almost impossible.
>
> Is there QRN on the frequency? Noise from faulty power lines, industrial equipment or consumer electronics, even if unnoticed by ear, can render the downlink undecodable.
>
> -Joe, N8FQ
>
> On Fri, 14 Dec 2007 23:43:09 -0500
> Michael Tondee <mat_62 at netcommander.com> wrote:
>
>   
>> Since for the moment I am down to just a two meter mobile for ham 
>> equipment, I have been trying to get a setup going for packet and APRS. 
>> At the moment I have only been experimenting with the receive side of 
>> things  but I'm not having much luck.
>> I'm using  a 4 element beam with Az/El tracking that I used to use when 
>> working the LEO's along with SatPC32 for rotor control.
>> I'm setup with AGWPE and UIview32 using a soundcard. I've tried several 
>> passes tuned to 145.825 and so far on just one I was able to get one 
>> small packet to decode on the UIView32 terminal screen. I'm not seeing 
>> any APRS stations appear on the map and on the last three good passes 
>> I've tried I've heard little if any packet activity at all. What am I 
>> doing wrong here?
>> Is it possible there is no activity on some of the passes? Even when 
>> I've heard packets I've only successfully decoded one.
>> Tnx for any advice or pointers someone could give,
>> 73,
>> Michael, W4HIJ
>> AMSAT # 36017
>>