ax25 Archives - CQ DE VK7BEN

Initial Packet Radio Setup, a PacComm TNC-320 attached to an Icom IC-706MkIIg, both powered on with the radio n 147.575Mhz FM — Packet Radio with a PacComm TNC-320 and Icom 706MkIIg

It really doesn’t feel like it was that long ago since I wrote about packet communications, however it is just over 9 years already, which is frightening for a variety of reasons.

Packet radio is close to my heart as providing a glimpse of computer communications prior to the advent of what we now know as the Internet. Most if not all of the pre-internet telecommunications infrastructure in Australia now only exists in museums or has been scrapped for metal. We’re at least one demographic generation in that have never heard a dialup modem handshake before outside of a YouTube video.

This may be the second time I have posted about packet radio, but this time I will be taking a much deeper dive.

It’s been quite a while between posts, and in fact this is only my second post since January. It’s not because I have been slacking off though. So I’ll try and give a bit of an update as to whats been going on.

A couple of weeks after my last post, my Grandfather died 🙁 It was for reasons known about to family, but it always happens sooner than you would like and the loss has been immense. I was particularly close to my grandfather and even 3 months later the thought that I can no longer see him is very raw and hard to deal with.

“Pa’s” influence on me has certainly be that of love for Tasmania’s vast wilderness. When I am not playing with amateur radio, I love taking photography of a wild Tasmania, of which you can see many of these photos over on Flickr.

Pa also encouraged my technical abilities and was fascinated by the things I was doing in the radio space, from who I contacted via DX, to how light could be modulated with audio along to being able to broadcast Television. As I said, I’ll miss my conversations with him.

AX.25 Packeteering Part I

Where the Heck is VK7BEN?