[RTTY] ARRL attack on current RTTY users

[Kok Chen]

On Nov 24, 2013, at 8:16 AM, Don Hill AA5AU wrote:

> It's called Winmor and it has a rate of either 47 or 94 baud
> and has a bandwidth of either 450 or 1600 Hz depending on which mode it used.

Winmor is actually very well behaved on the spectrum and was created as an open system without any "encryption" properties. 

I was watching one Winmor station two afternoons ago and it has a very nice and tight signal.

(I had spent that entire afternoon with my panadapter, scanning the 14100 to 14140 kHz region, trying to learn the characteristics of the Winlink stations).

Winmor is to be encouraged over the use of the proprietary PACTOR modems, IMHO.

The main problem is that there are people who are not happy enough with the throughput of Winmor and want higher and higher speeds, who knows what they need the higher throughputs for. 

There are also many users who don't understand, and don't want to understand how to operate radios (not their primary aim to get a ham license), and they prefer spending the money ($2000 is nothing to sailors) for a turn-key interface such as an SCS modem, rather than having to cobble together soundcards, SignaLinks, etc to use Winmor.

With an SCS box, you buy the cable, connect it to a radio, set it to USB, and off you go.  (At least, they *think.*)

However, if you go watch some of the stuff going on around 14110, it is almost comical.  You will see two PACTOR stations that are off tuned by 100 Hz beeping at one another for a minute without even establishing a link.   These guys could not even zero beat their rigs to within 100 Hz of one another -- not to mention the lack of any AFC system.  "Modern modes," my foot. (100 Hz is how far off Pactor III should lock, according to their specs.)

I am not sure, but I think Winmor, as an "AFSK" system, may be way superior to Pactor when it comes to tuning.

73
Chen, W7AY