[geeks] Moved to geeks: Cheap Ham radios (was Dayton Hamfest)

[James Fogg]

> I'm open to hearing wonderful stories, but I can't, for the life of
me,
> understand the draw.


The draw is different for everyone. There's no limit to what you can do
with the hobby. For many it's about yakking to friends on a Sunday
night. For others, it's about technical exploration.

When I was first licensed my interests were in packet radio and true
packet repeaters (not slow speed digipeters). I and my cohorts did some
amazing things with packet radio.

Now my interests are in antenna theory and propagation. Antennas are
rather exotic when you begin to truly understand them and propagation
prediction is a bit of an art. I've rather enjoyed "hearing" aurora
borealis, sun spots, whistlers and other atmospheric phenomena.

Some other people are working on more efficient digital modes, Some hams
gave us APRS, which is used elsewhere now, some hams gave us advanced
spread spectrum, some hams gave us trunking and hams are always pushing
the frequency envelope. They were the first to actually use microwaves
and continue to do so. They also developed vestigial sideband, ssb and
were the first to experiment with FM.

It's not just a bunch of cranky old men yakking on HF.