Last night I got to see a D-Star rig up and running and

it was pretty cool. I don't have a clue as to how it works and even less knowledge on how to set it up.

For me it is an entertaining toy but I see no practical use for it the way I look at things. It is internet dependent and I am into ham radio for it's independence from infrastructure. 

I knew it would not be long before some genius came up with something like that. In a nutshell, a  fairly low powered transceiver is hooked to a computer. You talk to the transceiver with a handi talkie and off it goes into cyberspace and through a series of things comes out the other end to someone with a similar rig.

To me it is a nice toy but I have no real interest in it.

To me what appeals to me about ham radio is the LACK of necessary infrastructure. When all else (including the internet) fails it ham radio that can get through.

Yesterdays ATNO (All Time New One) with Rwanda is somewhat of an example. I communicated with Rwanda briefly with my rig to his rig with no in-between structure. That's the type of thing that makes me smile. I independently made a long range contact.

The guy that hooked up his D-Star rig is a lot smarter than I am but I simply can't fathom the appeal. Then again I have seen a lot of very smart people do very complex things without practical use.

I remember a fellow ham trying to help me set up an IC-7200 for digital and I was missing something. It was a simple setting and he quickly figured out how to get things up and running with a magic box of some sort he could rig up with spare parts.

In truth all we needed to do was figure out which knob to turn. The rig was already set up for it.

There are an awful lot of smart people out there and maybe I am not one of them but I try to be practical.

On the other hand a lot of practical things come out of things that began life as impractical. Guys like the man I watched set up the D-Star rig are probably responsible for the cell phone we all use.

I will be the first to admit that I am somewhat of a Luddite. I still drive a manual transmission and it works for me. There is also a practical side for this. A clutch is quite an inner city anti theft device.





To find out why the blog is pink just cut and paste this: http://piccoloshash.blogspot.com/2009/12/my-feminine-side-blog-stays-pink.html NO ANIMALS WERE HARMED IN THE WRITING OF TODAY'S ESSAY