FlexRadio 3000 operation

Here is a full screen shot from this morning's operation on 60 m. Click on the image to enlarge it. The main window shows the receive audio spectrum display. To the right are two open configuration windows, with my notes added in red text. Near the bottom left of the full screen is the mixer window, which provides one of the places to set microphone gain.

I'll continue to read about and tweak the settings per owner's manual and W1AEX.com documentation. When I get the right connectors together, I'll try my old desk microphone, too. I plan to do some testing on my dummy load while listening on the Heathkit transceiver via headphones.

Thanks for everyone's signal reports and audio recordings!

John

HF Loop Options

I used the 4nec2 program to lay out and briefly analyze my options for setting up an HF loop antenna using the 4 trees I selected to suspend the loop over the back yard. The graphic here shows 2 options for a loop supported by the 4 trees (green discs). The outer perimeter, with dimensions (in feet) marked in red, totals 421 ft, and reaches every tree, and would be appropriate for coverage starting at 2.39 MHz. The height above ground would be about 25 ft.

The inner square, with dimensions in blue, shows a loop designed for about 3.7 MHz, totaling 272 ft.  The 4 line segments with green dimensions represent the ropes that would be needed to support the smaller loop from the same 4 trees. A convenient feed point, close to one end of my house, is near the lower right corner. In the antenna model this is represented by the pink circle. The house would be located partly beneath the 89 ft segment of the larger loop.

The far field radiation patterns for the two loops are somewhat similar, with 80 and 40 m producing one or two lobes with high angle of radiation. The higher bands yield lower angles of radiation, but with multiple lobes. On the 10 m band, the larger loop produces 14 lobes, and the smaller loop produces 12 lobes.

Now that I have a scale drawing saved as a NEC file, I'll explore some other alternatives (triangles?, dipoles?) before hanging wire.

John

Update:  I put up the smaller loop diagrammed above -- 68 ft on each side.

EasyBCD vs GRUB2

I learned about EasyBCD while reading some replies in this Google+ posting:
https://plus.google.com/111420842954473821448/posts/FHDERi6UCii

I thought about using EasyBCD on my Win7 laptop where I recently installed Ubuntu 13.04. The GRUB2 menu had Ubuntu as the default boot choice and 3 appearances of Win7, of which two were restore or recovery options. I was not sure I wanted to edit the GRUB2 menu. Then I also stumbled upon this forum posting by the user who ended up with tandem bootloaders:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2126946

Then I decided to stick with editing the GRUB2 menu. I found this solution to make it easier and was pleased with the results:
http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/43471/how-to-configure-the-linux-grub2-boot-menu-the-easy-way/

John

Fake software updates

We must all be aware that a very popular and effective tactic currently used to spread malware is the offering of fake updates to popular programs needed to view or play common web content. Examples include the Adobe Flash Player and various video players or web browser plug-ins. Suspicious or malicious web sites (sometimes not recognized as such) may offer desirable content that prompts the user to install updated viewer / player software. Sometimes legitimate web sites get infiltrated and have their pages altered with links that trick the user into accepting malware. Such offered updates may be fake and are designed to install malware.

Last year one of my family members tried to view a Star Trek video clip on a web site, which advised that an updated video player was needed. Upon downloading the supposed player update, a pop-up box advised that Antivirus 2010 had detected virus infections on the PC and that an update was needed to remove them. The update would require a credit card payment to proceed. Fortunately my family member went no further. I was able to remove the bogus Antivirus 2010 that was the actual malware.

This morning's roundtable discussion with my friends mentioned a Flash Player Pro update obtained from a web site that carried malware to the user's computer. A quick search on Google reveals that many instances of fake Flash Player programs or updates are lurking on the web.

If you believe that you need a particular viewer update, it is best to visit the original publishers' web sites rather than trust links on some content provider's web site. Some examples include:

http://java.com/en/ -- click on Free Java Download
http://www.adobe.com/ -- click on Download and choose Adobe Reader

http://www.adobe.com/ -- click on Download and choose Adobe Flash Player

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/default.aspx – go to the Download section

Note that Java and Flash are very popular current targets for malware distributors.

Installed anti-virus programs may not catch the malware that an unsuspecting user downloads from a web site. Some reasons for this failure are:

• Anti-virus programs rely mainly on profiles or signatures of discovered malware. Newly-developed malware may not be detected using current profiles.
• Anti-virus profiles must be updated frequently. Delays in updating can leave vulnerabilities to certain malware.
• Independent testing has not shown any antivirus program to be 100% effective.
• Malware programs are becoming more effective at evading detection.

You may want to go to http://secunia.com/vulnerability_scanning/online/ and run the Online Scanner to check your PC(s) for outdated software that has security vulnerabilities. This runs a Java applet to perform the scan. 

Here are two web sites that can enhance your understanding of many facets of online security:

GetNetWise

OnGuard Online

Take care! 

Chat Placeholders

Here is a screen shot showing my use of multiple chat room placeholders during this morning's QSO on 3740 kHz. The placeholders serve as a reminder, to QSO participants logged into the chat room, about our friends on the radio who are not logged into chat.  A web browser's support for multiple tabs enables creating the extra placeholder log-ins within a single web browser window. My personal favorite for handling many tabs is the Tree Style Tab add-on, as seen in this screen shot.

Sound card controls for VoIP patching

Here is an updated graphic with notes showing the results of my further testing of VoIP phone patching. I found it convenient to keep both sets of controls open, side-by-side, while using my headset (connected to the PC sound card (analog) jacks. Click on the graphic below for a larger view.

In general, the Recording settings (right side of graphic) control the audio going TO the distant VoIP party, on a phone call or Skype session, for example. The Playback settings (left side) control:

• the distant party's VoIP audio going to the transmitter
• the local operator's headset microphone audio going to the transmitter
• the receiver audio going to the local headset and to the distant VoIP party

The sound cards in my older PCs use a "select" check-box in the Recording controls. Only one choice can be selected at a time. To enable passing both microphone and receiver audio to the distant VoIP party, I select one of the "mix" settings. The sound card on my newer PC has mute check-boxes in the Recording controls. In that case I could mute or unmute any devices, in the same manner as provided in the Playback controls.

VoIP Patch Update

I've done off-air testing of my previously-successful VoIP phone patching using a younger PC (Pentium 4, 2.8 GHz). Here is an annotated screen shot that shows the sound card settings along with Skype audio settings. I'll use the three control panels shown during on-air operations while I verify the best configuration. Previously I have used only the Gmail Call Phone VoIP application. The younger PC has the CPU power needed to run Skype. The older Pentium 3, 600 MHz PC could manage Gmail Call Phone (Google voice) at 76 to 100% CPU utilization.

Click on the image below for a full sized view.