[amsat-bb] Re: Turn off AGC when receiving BPSK-1000

[Phil Karn]

On 8/19/11 7:51 AM, Gregg Wonderly wrote:

> What kind of digital are you suggesting?  Voice and data both?  A
> digital path from anywhere on the planet to the appropriate ground
> station is easily doable with some "documentation" of the ground stations.

Digital voice would be the easiest to support since the data rate is so
modest. Low rate data (< 100 kb/s) wouldn't be much harder. All it takes
is a stabilized platform with microwave antennas. Any ground station
with an Internet connection could automatically link with the ISS and
relay it to a central point (e.g., Houston) and then hand it off to the
next ground station. One advantage we hams have always had over NASA
itself are our numbers and geographical distribution. We obviously
wouldn't be able to cover the large parts of the earth that are entirely
water but we could still do a pretty good job with the rest.