IVCA VISION NEWS
LETTER No.12 February 7-
2002
THE INTERNATIONAL VISUAL COMMUNICATIONS
ASSOCIATION
Keeping Amateurs informed on Developments in Visual Communication
around the world
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General information
The future schedule
for 2002 Saturday IVCA SSTV net control operators on 14.230 MHz at
15:00Z is as follows.
Doug
K3DUG Feb
2 Mar
9 April
13 May
18
Charles k4ZET
Feb
9 Mar
16
April 20
May 25
Clarence W0TSL
Feb
16 Mar
23 April
27 June
1
Thomas KA4P
Feb
23 Mar
30
May
4
June 8
Ray
W5NOO Mar
2 April
6
May 11 June
15
IVCA
Membership and Dues
In reply to requests from new VISION News-letter
viewers. The VISION News Letter is free but we request that every one that
wishes to be a member and support the IVCA to send a $10.00 yearly fee to the
Treasurer James Gaither Jr. W4CR PO BOX 140336
NASHVILLE TN 37214 USA This is necessary to fund the Dayton Ohio meeting
expense and the various IVCA awards and functions.
IVCA News
Letters
We continue to add new amateurs to the VISION group
news letter mailing and have given permission for vision to be resent to your
local radio club members. The foreign non English stations may wish to use a
computer language conversion program and also send it to radio club members and
friends. You can receive back VISION copies at http://www.sstv.de/News/news.html
posted by Frank DL1FH
Be sure to notify me W5NOO ray@junct.com if you change your ISP or e-mail
address or wish to be removed from the VISION mailing.
New Web Network Using Your Power
Wiring ( Broadband and Light Bulbs)
To exchange information of various types we
typically use radio and the web with a phone line dial-up or DSL
connection or perhaps a Cable and even Satellites or wireless 802-11 A and
B at present but a new method is in development to use the Power Companies
wiring that's provided to your home to permit broad band web
connections. (Power Companies have communicated this way for years to activate
street lights etc.) I understand the new Amperion product sends broadband
to homes by way of medium-voltage transformers scattered through US
neighborhoods. This promises to deliver nearly universal Internet access at a
great savings.The president of Amperion Phil Hunt says "Power line
communications is a wonderful opportunity to use all of the wiring that's been
put in place, every socket in your home,all the overhead wiring in the streets,
to finally reuse that for data-delivery system" This is not without some
major technology problems or bugs. (Up to now I was only using the house
power wiring for a wireless intercom and various general electrical devices we
have ) Will the Power Company become your ISP?
New Computer
Hardware (You got the need for speed?)
If you find your older CD R/W slow in burning
(Recording) a CD, we now have a new fast CD R/W available from the Plexor Co.
the Plex Writer model 40/12/40 A that burns a new fast type CD
at a speed of 40X this permits a four-minute burn time and also a slower
24X speed or slower burn on regular CD's and CD R/W's using all of the
general burn software programs. The fast 40X CD disks are not generally
available yet and the unit is priced at $209 by the Mfg. Note: Some high RPM
speed 50X CD recorders and players can shatter a cracked or out of balance
or damaged CD even now! (Just when we solved the buffer under run and speed
problem now they can self destruct, just like on the Mission Impossible TV
show!)
Oooops
The correct address for the web page for
information on SSTV mode comparison is
http://www.baldeaglejournal.com/ARA.htm by Charles
Franklys that compares several popular SSTV modes for functions and
features!
IVCA VISION Editorial Policies
The IVCA is a nonprofit organization and the opinions and information
expressed in the VISION News Letters and links does not necessarily reflect that
of the IVCA. The purpose of the VISION news is to inform and promote the use of
Visual Communication. We do however try to inform Amateurs of new products and
technologies. The IVCA has no ads for products or services. We appreciate news
and ideas or suggestions and comments from all the viewers. Ray
W5NOO Editor
The Information Age (let's get the word out
on this neglected mode)
In the past very little information was available on SSTV and it was
difficult to get any thing published in the amateur journals. All this is
changing now. One new major information source is the numerous web home
pages devoted to SSTV. (A search with Google at http://www.google.com for "SSTV" will produce
over 67,000 sites. Even the Yahoo search engine will produce over 46,000
SSTV sites. Over the years I have personally given talks and
demonstrations at radio clubs and conventions and even talked on Broadcast FM
Radio and over special long distance telephone line to a VHF repeater link and
submitted articles with pictures to the local news papers and even managed
to get an article in QST magazine. I strongly encourage the IVCA members
to do some of the same. I have made overhead projector SSTV picture transparency
slide shows and also used a small computer and monitor slide show using
SSTV etc. pictures stored on a hard drive and a external ZIP disk drive for
demonstrations. I know some of you sure have all the necessary knowledge
and talent as I've seen some very impressive SSTV web pages . Ray W5NOO
Preparations for Dayton 2002 (getting under
way)
Don miller W9NTP the Dayton IVCA Coordinator informs me he has made
arrangements for a block of 20 rooms the cost is $100 plus tax and
reservation held till May 1 contact Don W9NTP soon . Also he
has arranged for a Saturday meeting room. More details on this later. If you
have never attended the Dayton Hamvention I strongly recommend you do. Dayton
has usually more that 40,000 in attendance with almost all the electronic and
amateur equipment manufacturers represented and a very big Flea Market . The
city of Dayton goes all out and arranges for transportation etc. It runs
this year 3 days in May 17,18&19 this is a excellent well run large
convention attended by Hams from around the world!.
The Annual IVCA SSTV Contest (in response to
your inquiries)
I'm working on the details of the next SSTV DX contest and will post all
the details and rules in the next news letter. The contest date will be April 20
and 21- 2002.
Computer Tips (Or how come this stuff is
not in the MS Windows Books?)
Several useful Windows 95/98 and WinME commands can be typed into the
little "Run" window on the windows desk top like even a web URL when
you are online and press enter it will then load the web page.. If you
click run and type in "sfc" and press enter it will do a
System File Check and look for missing or damaged windows files. If you click
run and type in "sysedit" and enter It will show your system
configuration. If you click run and type in "msconfig"
and enter it will display a window and let you click the startup tab and then
uncheck some items that you don't want to be on the task bar as they will
cause a slow down of your windows boot up, increasing computer start up
time.(Be careful however not to uncheck and remove some of the necessary items)
With the computer turned off then after you press the computer "power on"
and during the boot up process repeatedly keep pressing
the"F8" Function Key it will then display a window
where you can select the "Command Prompt Only" function
that let's you operate in the true DOS mode. If you have some damaged
operating system files and wish to make possible repairs when in the DOS mode
type "scanreg/restore" at the C:> prompt
and press enter, this will then let you select from some previous,
undamaged, stored versions of your system registration files. (Note:
The Windows95/98 & Win ME is just a DOS program with all those cute little
Icons etc.that you can view and click that are displayed and running on top of a
DOS operating system.) The new rugged WinXP or Win2000 and WinNT
operating systems is a different story however as they don't run on top of the
old DOS operating system but are far less likely to crash!
Happy Viewing (like to hear
from you) 73 Ray
W5NOO Director/Editor IVCA
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