VOA Radiogram, 7-8 September 2013: Fldigi, Flmsg, Flamp, RSIDs, MFSK

(Source: VOA Radiogram)

VOA Radiogram for the weekend of 7-8 September 2013 will include more experiments with RSIDs, the brief signals that automatically switch your decoding software to the correct mode.

For best results, please install Fldigi 3.21.75 from w1hkj.com. When you have 3.21.75 installed, go to Configure > ID > RsID, and adjust Errors to 0 (zero). This will prevent Fldigi from flipping to another mode while decoding our MFSK transmissions. For more information about this, seewww.w1hkj.com/FldigiHelp-3.21/ConfigID.html

Please also download the latest versions of Flmsg and Flamp (2.1.00) from w1hkj.com.

This weekend’s VOA Radiogram will include another transmission in MFSK128. This will be done mainly to see if the RSID works. However, to improve the chances for a successful decode of the very fast MFSK128, it will be in Flamp format. A paragraph will be divided into seven blocks of 64 characters each. And it will be transmitted three times, with the second and third passes filling in any blocks with incorrect checksums. Make sure Flamp is running before the MFSK128 transmission begins; it does not turn on automatically like Flmsg.

The foreign language for the weekend will be Spanish, with brief VOA news items in both plain text and Flmsg formatted. Please turn off and restart Fldigi before each of this weekend’s VOA Radiogram broadcasts to ensure the accented Spanish letters display correctly. You will need the UTF-8 character set. The adjustment can be found via Configure > Colors & Fonts.

In the Flmsg-formatted Spanish news story, you will see several html codes such as í for the accented characters. They might look like decoding errors, but the story should look OK when the web page renders.

To make Flmsg work with Fldigi, in Fldigi: Configure > Misc > NBEMS — Under Reception of flmsg files, check both boxes, and under that indicate where your Flmsg.exe file is located.

Here is the lineup for VOA Radiogram, 7-8 September 2013:

3:55 MFSK16: Program preview

2:09 MFSK32: VOA Spanish news re old iPhones

3:41 MFSK32/Flmsg: VOA Spanish news re new iPhone model

2:29 MFSK64: VOA News re Al Jazeera in Egypt

2:48 MFSK32: YouTube screen capture of Al Jazeera

:50 MFSK32: Introduction to MFSK128 item

1:30 MFSK128/Flamp: Brief description of VOA

:45 MFSK32: Introduction to MFSK64

2:55 MFSK64: VOA News re LADEE moon mission

2:56 MFSK32: Artist’s rendition of LADEE spacecraft

1:11 MFSK16: Closing announcements

:41 MFSK32: VOA Radiogram logo

:20 Surprise mode of the week

Please send reception reports to [email protected].

VOA Radiogram transmission schedule

(all days and times UTC)

Sat 1600-1630 17860 kHz

Sun 0230-0300 5745 kHz

Sun 1300-1330 6095 kHz

Sun 1930-2000 15670 kHz

All via the Edward R. Murrow transmitting station in North Carolina.

There will also be a minute of MFSK32 on The Mighty KBC, via Germany, Saturday at approximately 1130 UTC on 6095 kHz, and Sunday at approximately 0130 UTC on 7375 kHz (Saturday evening 9:30 pm EDT).