PA1JIM » Icom

Icom IC-756PRO-3, Signalink & Ham Radio Deluxe

PA1JIM — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 15:30:01 +0000

Last weekend I offered a friend of mine, Fred PA3YH, some help with his shack setup. He owns a Icom IC-756PRO-3 radio. Since a few months he bought a Signalink USB and works all different digital modes with it. Actually this combination works really well! He is doing great in QSO’s! The only thing missing was a good logbook. He did connect the rig via the Signalink to his laptop, but didn’t yet use rig control (Cat-V).

So these two things I want to help him with. First, rig control. Fred did already bought a cable for rig control. It is a USB – ACC-connector cable. After installing the driver for the cable, the laptop did see an extra com-port. Now download and fire up the latest copy of Ham Radio Deluxe. No problems so far. Imported his logbook from LogPA (his current log program). Also no problems. What surprised me was the super duper integration of HRD with the radio. I myself do not yet have a Signalink, but men what cool features do you have then! You are able to record sound of the rig, almost all options are controllable from the program.
Also figure out for him how to let Windows use the internal sound card and let the HAM-programs use the Signalink. I wasn’t able to fully test his new setup because he pushed me out of the way, that enthusiastic he was!
The cool thing about this new setup for Fred is that he makes enough time to investigate all the options and tricks. Hopefully I can benefit too from his investigation

Fix repeater bug in Icom 910H

PA1JIM — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 09:33:50 +0000

Some while ago I bought a beautiful second hand Icom 910H. Very nice radio to work with! Only one little problem: to work some repeaters over here in The Netherlands, you have to send a CTCSS-tone. Of course this rig is capable of sending a CTCSS-tone. But….. The original configuration for Europe is sending only one 1750 Hz tone when enable the tone-squelch.
But that is a bit of a problem since non of the repeaters send a tone back. So I was able to open some of the local repeaters, but unable to listen to them.
After posting my problem on a Dutch forum K6APR rushed in to help me out.
He posted a Icom 910h Repeater mod to enable the American/Korean repeater settings of my Icom. I did used the mod and it works! There are more options to work the repeaters and now I’m able to work all the local ones.
One little thingy to remember: when you’ve made the change, when you first put on the radio, all your memories will be reset. So please write down anything important!

New radio in the shack: Icom 910H

PA1JIM — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 13:50:07 +0000

I was looking for a new radio for a while. For 2m and 70cm I used my good old Yeasu FT-817. Actually my first radio. A perfect radio for mobile and backpack use, but not for the QTH.

For in the shack I wanted something a little bigger, multiband capabilities and the most important: more output power. Since I only use Yeasu and Kenwood I was curious for Icom. When I went searching for a good 2m/70cm transceiver from Icom I quickly stumbled on the 910H. Very interesting radio, good performance. And also capable of heavy duty ssb traffic. Something I don’t do often right now because I don’t have the right equipment.

So a second hand Icom 910H it wil be. Last week I found one on the internet. I went over for a good look and liked what I saw. So I bought the rig and now it’s humming in my shack! Welcome 910