[CQ-Contest] Dr. DX

[John Geiger]

I hope it wasn't set for CQWW at this solar cycle's maximum!

73 John AF5CC

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Gary Sutcliffe" <w9xt at unifiedmicro.com>
To: <cq-contest at contesting.com>
Sent: Tuesday, December 17, 2013 5:14 AM
Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] Dr. DX


> Dr. DX was an amazing piece of programming for its day. I saw it at 
> Dayton and immediately went out and bought one plus a C-64 to run it on.
> 
> It was so realistic. The propagation algorithm was set for CQWW at 
> sunspot maximum. If you tried to work 160M at noon you just heard 
> static. Midnight on 10M produced silence.
> 
> You had guys calling  with bad timing, chirpy signals, fast guys, slow 
> guys and lids calling CQ on your frequency.  I think if you copied a 
> call wrong the station would send it again. Then there was the 
> excitement when a really rare one called you.
> 
> More than once I was playing with it thinking I needed to go to bed but 
> could not pull myself from a big pile up - only to whack myself on the 
> side the head having forgotten this was just a simulation.
> 
> They ran some Dr. DX contests in NCJ.  You could set it up in contest 
> mode for some period of time and it produced a code that the 
> manufacturer could use to verify the score.
> 
> N6TR did one of his Z80 miracles and had it play against Dr. DX, 
> computer vs. computer. He would just crank up the speed enough to beat 
> the previous winner's score. There was also a trick that you did not 
> have to send the full call sign of of a station calling you, saving some 
> time.
> 
> A Windows version would be really neat.
> 
> Gary, W9XT
> www.w9xt.com
> 
> On 12/17/2013 3:59 AM, Tom Osborne wrote:
>> I remember they had a contest to see who could work the most countries.
>>
>>
>> Problem was, some figured how to crack it and that kinda ruined it.  73
>> Tom W7WHY
>>
>>
>>
>> Agreed.  It was an amazing program, especially considering the theory
>> limitations on the Commodore 64, which had about 32K of RAM. A Windows
>> version would use 100 Meg :-)
>> Barry W2UP
>>
>>
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> 
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> 
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