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From: info-atari@ucbvax.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.micro.atari
Subject: Amateur Packet Radio articles.
Message-ID: <8601152230.AA14803@mitre-bedford.ARPA>
Date: Wed, 15-Jan-86 17:30:05 EST
Article-I.D.: mitre-be.8601152230.AA14803
Posted: Wed Jan 15 17:30:05 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 17-Jan-86 03:23:53 EST
Sender: dlw@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The MITRE Corp., Bedford, MA
Lines: 27

I have a series of introductory articles explaining what Amateur Packet Radio
is all about, and would be glad to forward copies to interested parties.

For those who don't know, the ham packet network is well established along the
East and West Coasts, and is growing inland until it will meet in the next few
years.  Meanwhile there is some degree of HF ("shortwave") gateway service
on 20 Meters between the two subnets.  There is even the possibility of
links to Europe either via HF gateways or via Amateur Radio satellites.
Bulletin Board systems abound, and the neat thing is there are no phone bills!

All this is not particularly Atari-related, except that I am an Atari owner
and a ham radio operator (I am careful not to shorten this to just "ham"), and
am planning to put my 800XL on the air as a packet station in the near future.
I would be pleased to hear from anyone who has done so or is also planning it.
At present I am leaning toward doing my own software implementation rather
than buying the commercial interface board that is available with an RS-232
serial port.  It seems the Atari internal tone generators are more than
adequate for sending 1200-baud FSK in software, and the receive interface
takes only about 8 chips.

Atari fans, please consider this a pitch for getting into ham radio as a major
enhancement of the computer hobby.  The ham community stands ready to give you
lots of help and encouragement in getting through the not-so-difficult license
exam hurdle.

						-John Sangster, W3IKG
						jhs at mitre-bedford.arpa