Re: SBITx with Heil headset?
Hi Jens,
Brilliant idea, will try this over weekend.?
Thank you?
On Friday, March 21, 2025, 9:57 am, Jens / DH1AKY via groups.io <jens.wagner767@...> wrote: perhaps my article may help you:
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It's in German, please use a translator of your choice.
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73s,
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Jens/DH1AKY?
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Re: zBitx installed softwares
You know it sends VARA right?
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On Mar 21, 2025, at 04:43, Shirley Dulcey KE1L via groups.io <mark@...> wrote:
? If the details of the mode are not publicly available, that actually is a violation of amateur radio regulations, at least here in the US.? ?Either a protocol spec or an open source implementation will satisfy?that requirement.
You could argue that all of the modes that use digital voice codecs from DVSI (which include DMR, D-STAR, System Fusion, P25, and more, but not M17 and FreeDV which use an open source codec) should also not be used on ham radio by the same logic. Though they are not quite as undocumented because they are patented, which means that the details that are disclosed in the patent applications are available. Perhaps more important, the wide availability of commercial equipment that implements the DVSI codecs means that the FCC has no difficulty monitoring transmissions so long as the optional encryption (which is NOT allowed on ham radio) is not used. On Fri, Mar 21, 2025 at 2:00?AM Mikel EA5IYL via <mikel.forcada= [email protected]> wrote: VarAC (unlike FT8, JS8Call, Olivia, etc.) is a privative, closed-source mode (which in my opinion should not be allowed on air, precisely because of that). Unless the author(s) decide to port it to the new architecture, there's little chance.?
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Re: SBITx with Heil headset?
perhaps my article may help you:
?
?
It's in German, please use a translator of your choice.
?
?
73s,
?
Jens/DH1AKY?
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Re: zBitx installed softwares
If the details of the mode are not publicly available, that actually is a violation of amateur radio regulations, at least here in the US.? ?Either a protocol spec or an open source implementation will satisfy?that requirement.
You could argue that all of the modes that use digital voice codecs from DVSI (which include DMR, D-STAR, System Fusion, P25, and more, but not M17 and FreeDV which use an open source codec) should also not be used on ham radio by the same logic. Though they are not quite as undocumented because they are patented, which means that the details that are disclosed in the patent applications are available. Perhaps more important, the wide availability of commercial equipment that implements the DVSI codecs means that the FCC has no difficulty monitoring transmissions so long as the optional encryption (which is NOT allowed on ham radio) is not used.
On Fri, Mar 21, 2025 at 2:00?AM Mikel EA5IYL via <mikel.forcada= [email protected]> wrote: VarAC (unlike FT8, JS8Call, Olivia, etc.) is a privative, closed-source mode (which in my opinion should not be allowed on air, precisely because of that). Unless the author(s) decide to port it to the new architecture, there's little chance.?
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Re: zBitx installed softwares
I think it’s a reasonable expectation, as long as bluetooth is working well. ?There are enough pocket-sized bluetooth keyboards. ?I got one like this:??physically that one is not so great to type on: some keys are just a bit sticky. ?Maybe they aren’t all like that, and anyway I can get by with it for SOTA, not having to do much typing anyway. ?It has all the keys to use the terminal or any other application when I need to. ?Next time I would try one that uses a Blackberry keyboard, since actual Blackberry devices were known for having pretty good keyboards, and the keyboards are apparently still in production. ?https://www.tindie.com/search/?q=blackberry
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On Mar 21, 2025, at 09:16, Gerald Sherman via groups.io <ve4gks@...> wrote: When I get my zBit, I will be using an official Pi keyboard and
mouse - won't need an on-screen one. On 2025-03-21 05:11, Ken N2VIP wrote:
As a reminder, the zBitx has a functional, but limited
display and no provision for an on-board keyboard (beyond an
impossibly small on-screen keyboard, I suspect), the same as the
sBitx, but the sBitx has a much larger (physically and
pixel-wise) than the zBitx.
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it is very likely either radio will, at a minimum,
require/benefit from a USB or Bluetooth keyboard, if not a
companion device (tablet, smartphone or laptop).
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Re: zBitx installed softwares
When I get my zBit, I will be using an official Pi keyboard and
mouse - won't need an on-screen one.
Gerry
On 2025-03-21 05:11, Ken N2VIP wrote:
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As a reminder, the zBitx has a functional, but limited
display and no provision for an on-board keyboard (beyond an
impossibly small on-screen keyboard, I suspect), the same as the
sBitx, but the sBitx has a much larger (physically and
pixel-wise) than the zBitx.
?
it is very likely either radio will, at a minimum,
require/benefit from a USB or Bluetooth keyboard, if not a
companion device (tablet, smartphone or laptop).
?
Ken
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Re: zBitx installed softwares
It's a shame that the ROS / VaraC software hasn't been ported to Linux.
Surely the fact that the licenses have a price is, in large part, the reason.
At one time, its use was limited/banned in the USA, for more than debatable technical reasons, but it seems that this is already overcome when it is used as a de facto standard in emergency communications, precisely due to its excellent operability.
Using it on wine can be done, I do it on my PC, but it is still annoying, and each new version requires a lot of work. It may be that in a closed environment like zBitx/sBitx it is easier to port it.
In fact, what really complicates life is the ROS modem, I think that VaraC would be less complicated to move to Linux, but as long as the modem is not rewritten we will have to live with wine.
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Re: zBitx installed softwares
On Feb 17, 2025, at 00:54, Daniel AB0ZY via groups.io <danielalmondtree@...> wrote:
I'll second the hope that JS8 will be able to be run natively. FT8 is OK for killing time but JS8 with its relaying and inbox is useful! I haven’t yet looked into how different JS8 is from FT8. I wonder if there is any hope of adding it to ft8_lib. I think that would be the likely way I’d try to add it as a built-in feature; or else maybe js8call is already or could be nicely separated into a frontend and backend, so that we could just run it as a daemon and build a combined UI that connects both to sbitx and js8d? To dream further: what if we could run multiple modes at the same time? 25khz bandwidth ought to be enough to simultaneously monitor JS8, PSK, Olivia, ardop etc. as long as activity is going on in nearby frequencies. But the software is all designed for one-at-a-time use, and expecting 3khz bandwidth. So maybe sbitx/zbitx could eventually provide several 3khz channels at the same time, by subdividing the 25khz bandwidth, and then these legacy programs can deal with that? Probably we could still only transmit on one channel at a time, of course, and time-sharing the transmitter might work. On Mar 21, 2025, at 07:00, Mikel EA5IYL via groups.io <mikel.forcada@...> wrote:
VarAC (unlike FT8, JS8Call, Olivia, etc.) is a privative, closed-source mode (which in my opinion should not be allowed on air, precisely because of that). Unless the author(s) decide to port it to the new architecture, there's little chance. I get the impression that ardop / pat may be the way to go so far, for email over HF: it’s open, and seems to be widely supported by winlink gateways in my area. (Not that I got it working yet!) What are the disadvantages? How’s the resistance to noise? Will it still be useful during solar-minimum conditions? Who’s using it on sbitx now? Is there anything better?
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Re: zbitx schematics and source code
On Mar 19, 2025, at 18:00, Ashhar Farhan via groups.io <farhanbox@...> wrote:
The zbitx source code is now available on github.? and?
Please note that this code has not been tested on the sbitx, though it has been derived from the sbitx base.
I did a side-by-side comparison of this zbitx repo and the farhandev branch of sbitx. ?They look suspiciously similar, with some newer changes brought in, but it looks like it’s still clearly meant for sbitx. ?All the strings still say sbitx. ?So this is not really what you are shipping, is it? ?If we look at git log:
a45c3d8 2025-03-19 22:09 ?(HEAD -> main, origin/main, origin/HEAD) ?zbitx main board schematics added ? (2025-03-19 22:09)[Ashhar Farhan] af7fa8c 2024-07-08 02:58 ? Wisedowm files chekced in ? ?(2024-07-08 02:58)[Ashhar Farhan] 14093e4 2024-07-08 02:49 ? tested cw with the threaded keyer ? ?(2024-07-08 02:49)[Ashhar Farhan] 4df1fed 2024-07-08 01:22 ? Added OLED support, ask me for details ? ? ? (2024-07-08 01:22)[Ashhar Farhan] ef4dcba 2024-07-08 01:11 ? Merging the CW keying time lag fix ? (2024-07-08 01:11)[Ashhar Farhan] d873d14 2024-07-08 01:01 ? Added AM mode ? ? ? ?(2024-07-08 01:01)[Ashhar Farhan]
there is only one recent patch, addition of the schematics. ?(Thanks for that!)
The more similar it is, the easier it is to keep working on patches for both zbitx and sbitx at the same time. ?But I would think you would factor out the things that are different into as few files as possible, if they continue to be that similar. ?
I am working on some patches, trying to separate the frontend from the backend so that other UIs are possible. ?So I wanted to see whether I can easily apply them to both code bases. ?But it’s hard to believe that you are going to routinely run a version with?sbitx_gtk.c as-is, considering that your display is now an Arduino project connected over a slow channel, not an X server, and can’t show the GTK-based UI. ?Of course that UI is still useful if an HDMI monitor is attached, or for remote-X11 use over the network; but not so much on the zbitx as it ships? ?So my goal is to eventually have a radio daemon with no UI, and separate UI processes as needed. ?I think we both have the same problem: GTK is not useful if you don’t want to see that UI anywhere, and yet it’s hard to remove. ?I figured maybe you started to take some steps in that direction.
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Re: zBitx installed softwares
VarAC (unlike FT8, JS8Call, Olivia, etc.) is a privative, closed-source mode (which in my opinion should not be allowed on air, precisely because of that). Unless the author(s) decide to port it to the new architecture, there's little chance.?
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Re: zBitx installed softwares
As a reminder, the zBitx has a functional, but limited display and no provision for an on-board keyboard (beyond an impossibly small on-screen keyboard, I suspect), the same as the sBitx, but the sBitx has a much larger (physically and pixel-wise) than the zBitx.
?
it is very likely either radio will, at a minimum, require/benefit from a USB or Bluetooth keyboard, if not a companion device (tablet, smartphone or laptop).
?
Ken
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Re: zBitx installed softwares
I was an early uBITX fanboy. And I am a huge Farhan fanboy. So much to like here.? If JS8Call and Winlink had a baby, it would be VarAC. The evolving VarAC application is a killer diller if you like 1000% perfect comms, vmail, a million features and more. The greatest utility of VarAC may be the organic support for asynchronous comms. But there are a million other lovely slaying features.?
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Running VarAC natively on a zBitx or SBitx would motivate me to purchase, build and use the new rigs. If I have to lug a laptop along, with all the complications (power, connectivity, bulk, etc. etc. etc.), then the radio becomes a USB dongle. And all my radios are USB dongles as is because I have to lug a laptop around. Free me from the laptop! Run any modern application (varAC this week, who knows what next week?) natively...oh great one...I beseech you. hahha.?
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Re: zbitx schematics and source code
On Wed, Mar 19, 2025 at 06:27 PM, Ron Carr wrote:
Sorry for snooping into the code
It's open source. Snooping is encouraged!
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Re: zbitx schematics and source code
Farhan,
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Sort, should be “Hard Work”.
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Re: zbitx schematics and source code
Farhan,
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Thank you, for all your hark work. It’s been well worth the wait!!.
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Tanks again,
Robert, AG6LK?
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Re: SBITx with Heil headset?
Hi kc5kwz
I'm assuming?you are running your radio from?+12 VDC or?+13 or so -- if you are measuring?+9 on the mic that means they have already added a resistor to ground to lower the DC bias voltage.? ?On the V2 that I'm currently working on, I found it was running?+7 Volts, indicating a resistor had been added as well.? Although not on the published SCHEMATIC, others have shown photos showing the resistor.? ?I remember having to add one on the DE version I used to own.
The high output mic that I suggested is indeed shown as "typical" 2V -- but it is specified to work all the way to?+10.? ?They work FINE for me at?+7 and they should work FINE for you also.? ?
However, I don't exactly know what is causing the "wind" or "rushing" noise you?are describing.? ? So not sure what will fix it.? ?
If there is any way that you can listen to your own signal, that is the easiest and best way to work out these problems.? ?Some ways that will work: a)? a separate receiver with a tiny antenna, just enough to pick up some signal, allowing you to listen to yourself b)? use a WEBSDR, either from the kiwi sites, or from the Websdr.org sites -- there are more of the kiwi's it turns out
Let us know what you find out! 73 Gordon KX4Z
Gordon, the mic supply voltage on my sBitx DE is showing 9v. The mic you are using shows operating voltage of 2v.
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All you did was add the resistor right?
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The mic I am using is one that came with the uBitx v3 kit. I have some noise in the audio that sounds kind of like a mic in the wind with no wind screen on it. Was described to me as a rushing sound by another HAM.
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So I'm hunting for more mic options for troubleshooting.
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73
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Re: SBITx with Heil headset?
Gordon, the mic supply voltage on my sBitx DE is showing 9v. The mic you are using shows operating voltage of 2v.
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All you did was add the resistor right?
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The mic I am using is one that came with the uBitx v3 kit. I have some noise in the audio that sounds kind of like a mic in the wind with no wind screen on it. Was described to me as a rushing sound by another HAM.
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So I'm hunting for more mic options for troubleshooting.
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73
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Thanks folks. That’s what I get for reading instructions. After I posted I found the button on the screen. All good now. Thanks.
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Re: zbitx schematics and source code
Sorry for snooping into the code but
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? ?else if ((encoder_now == 0 && encoder_now == 2)?? This line should compare encoder state to encoder now
? ? ? || (encoder_state == 2 && encoder_now == 3)
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It's easy in the 64 bit version.  ?
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Jens / DH1AKY
Shirley Dulcey KE1L
EB3AM Jordi