[CQ-Contest] RTTY and Keyboard Lockups

[Michael Coslo]

On Jan 8, 2008, at 4:12 PM, Lee Buller wrote:

> I had a great time in the Round Up....what a fun contest even with  
> a moderate station.  What do all you RTTY expert contesters do to  
> keep RF out of the keyboard.  Now, I did not use the keyboard a  
> lot, but when I had to, it seems to double each key ssttrrookkee.   
> I am assuming that was some sort of RFI issue with the keyboard.  I  
> have it choked off with about 4 clip on beads, but I think I an  
> going to have to wind the cable on a toroid.  Anyone have any  
> experience with this issues?

I had similar trouble. If you are using a mouse, that is a big  
culprit. I cured mine by putting several clip-on ferrites on the  
mouse cable, at both ends. Wind the cable through the hole as many  
times as you can. Eventually I took the one off near the mouse, as it  
kinda made using the mouse kind of clumsy.

	Same goes for the power supply leads, and any other cables, such as  
serial or USB.

	Laptops usually start out with fairly decent shielding, and most  
problems happen when RF gets in through a cable of some sort. you  
might want to check out the RF level in the shack in general.

	Last thought is your program. If you are using a simple terminal,  
some settings can cause keypresses to double. Simple way to check  
that is to try the software without your radios or amp turned on. Not  
at all likely, but just thrown out as a cautionary.

-73 de Mike N3LI -