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PSK31
Literally meaning
Phase
Shift
Keying,
31 Baud. Baud is an indication for the speed in which the phase of the radio
signal is shifted.
The 31 baud BPSK modulation
system used in PSK31 was introduced by SP9VRC in his SLOWBPSK program written
for the Motorola EVM-board. Instead of the traditional frequency-shift keying,
the information is transmitted by patterns of polarity-reversals (sometimes
called 180-degree phase shifts). This process can be thought of as equivalent to
sending information by swapping-over the two wires to the antenna, although, of
course, the keying is more usually done back in the audio input into the
transceiver. A well-designed PSK system will give better results than the
conventional FSK systems that amateurs have been using for years, and is
potentially capable of operation in much narrower bandwidths than FSK. The 31
baud data rate was chosen so that the system will just handle hand-sent typed
text easily.A web site dedicated to the PSK31 mode, with a lot of
well organized information is:
http://www.psk31.com
Click on the 'Articles' button to get more
information about this sophisticated mode. Or hit the
'Software'
button to have a look at an array of programs to
choose from, almost all freeware.
About four years ago, when the mode was still rather new, I started to use
PSK31SBW, the original (updated) program by Peter Martinez, G3PLX. Similar to a
portion of Logger (and others), simple to use, but currently it lacks an
important feature: the spectrum display. The program requires Windows and a SB
compatible sound card.
I you like you can download the latest version of Peter's program called
p31sbw105.zip from the Unofficial PSK31 WWW homepage http://www.qsl.net/wm2u/psk31.html
From this page a lot of other downloads can be effected.
About two years ago I switched to
DigiPan
also a freeware program for PSK31, mainly for its panoramic capabilities.
The software by the American KH6TY, Howard (Skip) Teller
and the Russian Nick Fedoseev, UT2UZ, (the author of MIXW32, a shareware
program) has really taken hold in the PSK31 crowd, mostly due to its ease of use.
There's also a family of inexpensive PSK31 transceiver kits that make full use
of DigiPan's panoramic capabilities through the use of a 4000 (more or less) Hz
wideband IF from Small Wonder Labs (great write-up in QST).DigiPan stands for
"Digital Panoramic Tuning" and brings the ease and simplicity of
PANORAMIC reception and transmission to PSK31 operation. DigiPan provides a
panoramic display of the frequency spectrum in the form of an active dial scale
extending the full width of the computer screen. Depending upon the transceiver
IF bandwidth, it is possible to "see" as many as 40 to 80 PSK31
stations at one time.
The Digipan program can be downloaded
from URL:
http://www.digipan.net/
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
An example of the Digipan
screen with the 'waterfall' display at the bottom. The green line to the right
of the display is the phase indicator of the signal. The vertical green line
means in this case that the phase of both signals are correct; 180° out of
phase. In the text you can see that the reception at the Russian end is not so
good, although he gave '599' earlier. He keeps spelling the
call sign as N4MII
instead of N4MIS. The latter has a nice way of spelling MIS: Mighty In Size!!
The Russian station indicated earlier that the received signal was the
'standard' 599!! In the end he sees his mistake and corrects it.
The Hamscope program is also very nice as
it can handle, apart from PSK31 - called here BPSK
- it also can handle QPSK, CW, RTTY, MFSK16 and FEC!
The program Hamscope can be downloaded from
the following URL: http://www.qsl.net/hamscope/HamScope.html
Other links were all sorts of information can be found are:
http://bipt106.bi.ehu.es/psk31.html
http://bipt106.bi.ehu.es/psk31theory.html A reader on PSK31 Fundamentals
http://www.kender.es/~edu/indice.html The "official" PSK31 Homepage....
http://home.teleport.com/~nb6z/psk31.htm
http://www.w5bbr.com/psk31.html
http://www.psk31.org/
http://www.rarchams.org/psk31.htm
PSK31 (Phase Shift Keying 31 Baud) is best viewed as a "high octane"
cousin of RTTY (Radio Teletype).
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