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If you feel that you would like to provide an Internet to RF gateway using eqso software there are various ways of going about it. In the UK you must first obtain a NOV (Notice Of Variation) from the Radio Authority, these can be applied for online here. Physically connecting the radio to the PC is done by using one of the following methods, all of which work equally well.




VOX UNIT - These can be bought or easily built. In the UK a board can be bought from CPC part number HK00035 or built easily at home.





ILINK BOARD - Again these can be bought or built at home, though home construction is made a little harder with this board than the vox unit due to the PIC's needing to be programmed. Ilink boards can be built using one of many available ccts or bought here.

ILINK INTERFACES - High quality hardware listing: Interface boards from WB2REM and G4CDY Interface boards, kits and built units from VA3TO

COM PORT KEYING - This is the quickest and easiest way to get your gateway on the air using only a handful of components.



In the above methods, connections are made between the audio out of your radio to either the line in or mic sockets of your soundcard, and, from either the line out or speaker sockets of your soundcard to the mic socket of your radio. With the com port keying method and the ilink board a serial port on the PC is utilised to control keying the radio via the mic PTT socket, whilst with the vox unit, a connection is made to the radio mic socket PTT directly from the vox unit. If you have a modern radio with a data connection this can be used instead of the mic and audio out connectors of your radio. If you use the line in connector of your sound card then the mic volume slider on the eqso software will not work and you then have to use the volume control on the task bar.

SOUND CARD SETUP
To connect a radio to eqso you must download the gateway version of the software as opposed to the PC user version. When this is copied on to your hard drive you first need to set up your sound card. Double click on the volume control of your soundcard (next to the clock on your taskbar) and you should find yourself at the volume control window. If you have elected to use the mic socket on your soundcard then you need to find the mic control and to prevent feedback you need to mute this. Similarly if you are using line in then you need to mute the line in volume control. Next select the recording properties (options, properties then recording) and make sure that your chosen method of line in or mic is enabled.



CONFIGURING THE SOFTWARE
Start up the software, fill in your callsign in the callsign box and in the cw id box, put in the comments box a brief description of your gateway. Make sure that the vox box is ticked. Occasionally the server may drop momentarily, by ticking the auto reconnect box the software will attempt to reconnect to the server automatically. The speed, frequency and volume boxes are for the C.W. identifier and courtesy tones, these are best adjusted to suit individual needs, just adjust each one individually and click on apply until you are happy with each setting. The courtesy tones, force id and id if idle are again user preference settings. Courtesy tones plays the (default) letter k at the end of each over over the radio, force id plays your cw callsign at intervals set by the server (usually every 10 mins to comply with licensing conditions) again over your radio as does id if idle. Squelch settling is another control that may need fine tuning to your own particular set up, this is the amount of time that the software prevents you from sending audio down the internet after your PTT has switched off. This prevents "tail chasing" which is the crunch of static heard after you stop transmitting.NOTE The eqso software needs shutting down and restarting after each adjustment is made to the squelch settling. The silence level slider is a vox level adjustment, which we will come to later

Next step is to click on the rig-keying button, you will then be presented with another window. Here you must first select the method with which you are keying the radio. If you are using the vox unit then you will use the continuous tone method. This mixes a sub-audible tone onto the audio received from the internet, which keeps the vox unit keyed up during pauses in received audio. The default frequency of 80Hz has been found to be satisfactory in most cases, though the audio level of this tone may need increasing. If you are using the Ilink board then all you need to do is select the ilink board method and click on the correct port that you have the ilink board plugged into, under the ilink board setup tab. For com port keying select the com port keying method and then select the com port which you are using from the drop down box. The invert voltage box is for keying different radios whether they are positive or negative voltage keying. Select which pin (RTS or DTR) on the serial port is providing the signal (on the above com port keying cct the DTR pin is used and should be selected)

FINE TUNING AND TESTING
Now to get on air and fine tune things. Connect to room101 repeater.dns2go.com from the preset drop down box and wait for someone to start talking. If all is well your radio should go into tx and using a separate receiver you should be able to adjust the level of the transmitted audio using the output slider until the audio is clear and undistorted. If not go back and check your connections and settings.
Next preferably in a quiet conference room (to avoid causing disruption) set the squelch on your radio to a suitable level to prevent any noise breaking through. Using a hand held or similar start transmitting and you should see your callsign highlighted in the window and be able to monitor your audio levels on the VU meter. Using the mic slider level on the software and the radios volume control set the audio peaks on the VU meter to not much more than half way up the meter, and definitely not into the red as audio distortion will occur.
When you are happy with these settings check that when your radio stops transmitting that your callsign does not momentarily become highlighted again. If it does it means that your squelch settling is not set correctly and that the "crunch" of noise that occurs when your radio stops transmitting is being sent down the internet. Adjust the squelch settling time by 100ms a time until you stop this from happening.
Setting VOX/Silence levels: Set silence fully to the left, put vox slider right at the top. Turn on vox, talk into the mic while moving the vox slider down until the server acknowledges you are talking. You will lock the room up while you are doing this so be quick! Now be quiet and move the silence level to the right until the server says you have stopped talking.



J. RUSHTON....G0WZL MAY 2002