[RTTY] MMTTY Profiles - checked yours lately?

[Jon Harder]

I'm a long time MMTTY user who has been captivated by this wonderful
software from the first release right up to the current version.  Thanks,
Mako-san!

After some recent startling experiences, I felt I should alert MMTTY users
(stand-alone or
under any software combo) that their Profiles settings need to be carefully
checked from time to time, as some of the profile "default" settings appear
to turn
on NET and AFC, as well as sometimes altering HAM values.  The user wouldn't
necessarily know this - as when the Writelog plugin is set not to show the
buttons on
the MMTTY control panel, or with  "MMTTY engine" only software like YPLog
and Hamscope which show only a limited tuning display.  The results can be
chaotic. Here's what I mean.

It's easy to select a special profile (like MultiPath or Flutter) in the
heat of contest conditions and not realize what has happened to some vital
settings like your basic tone preferences unless you have carefully
optimized and saved a profile that fits your own receiving needs.  The MMTTY
Help file tells exactly how to do this.

And what's wrong with having NET or AFC turned on?  Mainly it's the risk of
not listening on your own transmit frequency.  This can be fatal during
contest conditions.  If you're using FSK only, as I do, your transmit
frequency is unaffected, but MMTTY may not be able to decode another
station's transmission, or even know that he or she is calling, unless you
have the receive passband open far too wide for comfortable copy, especially
during a contest. Neither NET nor AFC are of practical use in fast-paced
exchanges.

As W7TI recently commented:

"It would seem to me that the best approach would be to:

1. Never have NET on at all.
2. Leave AFC off when S&P'ing.
3. Have AFC on only when CQ'ing.

With all the other things going on in a contest perhaps this is too
much to ask, but it should go a long way toward alleviating the
off-frequency response problem. "

I definitely agree!

As an op who prefers "low tones," 1275/1445 Hz, I was startled to find that
accidentally picking one of the un-optimized "default" profiles had changed
my demod pitch to 2125/2295 high tones without my being aware of it until
the decoder just would not copy a strong signal.   That led me to check
things out in the Options/Setup tab, reset them, and then to completely
review all my profiles to be sure that HAM would always give me the low
tones I'm used to.

The text file UserPar.INI in the MMTTY directory holds the profiles, and
after confirming my desired settings for each one via the Options/Setup tabs
and resaving it in the Profiles/Assign Menu dialog, I've just copied
UserPar.INI into other software directories which use the engine inside
their programs for RTTY (YPLog and HamScope in my case.) This way things
should behave pretty much the same in all the programs where you use this
terrific program, including stand-alone MMTTY.

Once more, great appreciation to Mako-san for a true labor of love in giving
the world of "steam RTTY" a new burst of life.

Very 73,

Jon     K1US
into RTTY since 1970