181–190 of 196 posts
If it supported aviation bands, I would get it to use as a backup radio while flying. Not sure how far it would transmit though.
Anything aviation-related normally has 5 to 10x cost of mass-market products. Plus you probably need a licence to transmit in those bands.
This is a wacky idea, but the "modern" thing to do would be to repurpose seldom used 2-meter repeaters and make them 5G gNBs in the 3300 to 3450 MHz ham band (which overlaps NR band 78). Then you could directly use your cell phone (with a different SIM card) as your ham radio. Network gaming servers to the gNBs and every kid in the US will want a ham license. https://github.com/srsran/srsran_project
But I think you could set up a global mesh network. I think what sucks is the encryption rules, but if there could be a big enough force that demonstrates it and its usage, those rules could get changed (there is already pressure to do so).
Now one thing though is there's some fuzziness about the definition of encryption with the FCC's definition[0]. Would this include routing protocols and/or compression? If they're open source protocols? If call sign is sent uncompressed and clear? This seems to be kosher considering other projects I've seen. So the messages might be able to be snooped on by anyone, but this would mostly be for fun and demonstration, like Ham is. But also, I think it would be pretty cool to have an open global communications platform. It would definitely also serve as a useful thing for natural disasters. (But we're not in the cold war anymore... we have encryption over the internet and that's even much more obscured. It would be nice to see encryption and a community driven global communication network)
The other thing I've been wondering is if anyone has tried satellite bouncing with the starlink sats? I'm sure they wouldn't be too happy about that, but hey, it is at least interesting to understand conceptually since you could really get a much larger view area and you don't need to travel all the way to the moon. But doing this you could potentially open up the network for coverage over oceans (at least more easily)
[0] https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-47/chapter-I/subchapter-D...
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You also need a 5G core to make that work. Also probably an IMS to actually provide some services on top of that. You also need to rip out all the encryption for the ham bands.
You could always somehow make the vibration motor a "movement feature", and call the phone a "remotely controlled vehicle" ;-) Chatgpt- Yes, using the vibration motor to make small position changes on a remotely controlled vehicle would fall under the category of controlling the vehicle. If you encrypt the control signals that dictate when and how the vibration motor activates to achieve those position changes, it wo…
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Sometimes yes, not always, and practice decreased as privacy concerns increased. The old one for our city that was still printed up to about a decade ago did not have them. And yeah, could probably find some way to spoof. And yes, people can find things, just makes folks here uncomfortable that it would be readily available to a random nut in a short list linked to a "pseudo" one might be using routinely. Anyway. It'…
Agreed -- I'm with you 100% on the opsec hygiene regiment. But FWIW, I think "Firstname Lastname Postal_Address" has never been easily kept private (indeed, the winning strategy is subterfuge), and that adding "Callsign" does not change that equation. Of course it does mean that you shouldn't use your callsign as a pseudonym online. And I am not a person who is comfortable with the idea of a ham vanity plate! :) But…
But, I could just get some training just to improve utility in an emergency then take the license thing under consideration. I know some hams so wouldn't be too tough to learn the basics.
The key selling point is the single power source. Most average consumers carry charging tools for their phone, and don't want to manage another device like a radio. I personally prefer standalone handy-talkies, but powering them is still a pain. I wish a company would redesign the baofeng to run off of 18650 cells
The UV-9R Pro takes batteries that have a USB-C charging port on the back. I have a couple I setup as my disaster radios because of that and them being water proof(ish, better than other models at least). Programmed them with the local repeaters, weather channel, and the 2m and 70cm simplex calling frequencies plus whatever the default channel setup was.
I just want something that takes battery cells.
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forgive my ignorance here please, but I've read about APRS on and off for a few years and always wondered what I'd need to just transmit some data that would eventually make it's way to the internet. I recently suggested it to a Ornithologist friend doing back country research in South Afrika too. But why are there no regularly recommended cheap hardware solutions that can do this (and or just hobbyist builds using a…
APRS is actually pretty simple protocol. Data is encoded by modulating tones in a human's hearing spectrum, so if you tuned into the APRS frequency with any-purpose scanner (like most Baofengs), you would hear your childhood if you are old enough to remember 52k modems. The sound wave is easy to decode and encode with software. There are plenty of programs (Linux even has dedicated kernel modules) which turn your sou…
Funnily enough someone posted down a few comments here almost exactly what I had complained about not existing ( http://www.mobilinkd.com/ ) at least if I understand that page correctly.
> The radio simply plugs into the USB C port on your Android smartphone and transforms it into a fully-fledged handheld radio transceiver. When I saw the headline I was hoping someone had hacked the qualcomm modem and turned it into a software defined radio.
how the turntables. Back in the 80s my grandfather (N4MDB RIP) had a ham radio in his car and used something called an "autopatch" which could dial phone numbers. He'd call my grandma and say we were going shopping or whatever. Everybody from the shack could listen in with their radios. He tried to get me interested in ham radio but at the time I was exploring the internet and ham seemed... boring? Overly fussy with…
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It uses the phone's battery, which is assumed to be something that is already managed.
So just assume your Baofeng battery is also managed. Tada! Two battery free solutions.
Lots of dismissive comments in here, which I don't understand. KV4P did an awesome project that he spent a lot of time and effort on, and then shares it with the community. I think he did a great job, and I am very tempted to build one myself. I've been doing HF only, but this makes me want to start exploring VHF.