(Source: VOA Radiogram)
Gerhard, W6XH, recently purchased a vintage 1938 Philco console receiver, then used it to decode a VOA Radiogram. Brilliant!
Using a 1938 Philco receiver to decode a digital VOA Radiogram
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Category Archives: News
Voice of Greece update
Good news from our reader and regular Greek correspondent, Christos:
I listen to the programmes of ERT, almost everyday.
They continue transmitting as usual, with full programming, even these days around 15th of August (Virgin Mary Day) which is the peak of the Greek holidays. Other years we had a 2-3 minutes news bulletin and a lot of uninterrupted music.I have written some comments about it in my blog but only in Greek.
I also have another post with photos of the radio programming producers. I am sure you have listened to some of them from the VoG.
Christos then sent this listening report:
I have checked the frequencies of VoG at my summer house in Marathon. I found out that VoG is on air on 7450kHz and 9420kHz. I couldn’t hear anything on 15630kHz, the one that was active yesterday.
Be sure to check out Christos’ blog for more details (in Greek).
Additionally, Moshe commented on my last post with this logging:
VOG Was heard last night at the 19 Meter band (I was monitoring it with my tube radio, later on confirmed it on 15650KHz).
As for now, VOG is on the air on 19 Meter Band.
Thank you, Christos and Moshe–you’ve set my mind at ease for the moment. In my current travels I can’t easily receive VoG with my portable, so I’m grateful for these reports.
Shortwave Radio Recordings: Voice of Greece 8-14, but no signal last night
I’m a little concerned: last night I couldn’t hear the Voice of Greece on 9,420 kHz. Not even a carrier.
Though I’ve noticed they’ve had intermittent transmitter problems in some broadcasts (you can even hear it in the first minutes below) they haven’t gone off the air this long in recent memory. Not even when they were ordered to stop broadcasting. I fear that when the new Greek national broadcasting service emerges, their international arm may be cut. Their budget is tight and I imagine their shortwave service will receive strong scrutiny.
I would appreciate any news and reports from listeners. If you hear VOG on the air, please comment with frequency and time. [Update: Check out this post from Christos.]
In the meantime and for your listening pleasure: one hour and forty three minutes of the Voice of Greece. Recorded Wednesday, August 14, 2013 on 9,420 kHz starting at 00:00 UTC.
Click here to download the recording as an MP3, or simply listen via the embedded player below:
Atlantic 2000 on air Sunday August 18
Thanks to HK for the tip:
Atlantic 2000 will be on the air this Sunday 18th of August from 08:00 to 09:00 UTC (10:00 to 11:00 CEST) on 6005 and 9480 kHz, and at the same time on our webstream.
Only precise and detailed reception reports will be confirmed by QSL-card.
Atlantic 2000 émettra sur 6005 et 9480 kHz ce dimanche 18 août de 08:00 à 09:00 TUC (10:00 à 11:00 heure de Paris).
L’émission sera diffusée à la même heure sur notre site internet.
Seuls les rapports d’écoute précis et détaillés seront confirmés par QSL.
—
Visit our website :
http://radioatlantic2000.free.fr
Trilingual VOA Radiogram this weekend
(Source: VOA Radiogram)
VOA Radiogram on 17 and 18 August will include our first attempt to transmit Chinese characters. (It’s part of a VOA Chinese story about the future of BlackBerry.) And there will be a VOA News story in Spanish. To view the Spanish accents and the Chinese characters, your character set should be UTF-8. In Fldigi: Configure > Colors & Fonts to change the character set.
The broadcast will also include an Flmsg VOA News story including an SVG-formatted VOA logo created by Mark Hirst in the UK. If you have Internet Explorer, and cannot see the logo, try renaming the Flmsg file with an .xhtml suffix.
If you listen to more than one broadcast of VOA Radiogram this weekend, close Flidigi and restart it between broadcasts. This is because something in Flmsg turns off the UTF-8 character set, even though Fldigi is still configured for UTF-8.
Two of this weekend’s VOA News stories on VOA Radiogram feature VOA journalists who are radio amateurs. VOA Asia correspondent Steven Herman, W7VOA (@W7VOA), is interviewed about his visit to North Korea, and George Putic, KI4FNF, wrote the story about the renewed search for extraterrestrial life.
And there will be a VOA News story about a way to keep older brains healthy — other than experimenting with digital modes.
Here is the lineup for VOA Radiogram, 17 and 18 August 2013:
3:04 MFSK16: Program preview
4:50 MFSK32: VOA Spanish logo and news re VOA app
1:46 MFSK32: VOA Chinese logo and sample text
3:26 MFSK32: VOA News re benefits of hot chocolate
1:22 MFSK32: VOA Radiogram logo and addresses
4:43 MFSK64: VOA’s W7VOA visits North Korea
1:18 MFSK32: Photo of W7VOA in Pyongyang
3:28 MFSK64/Flmsg*: VOA’s KI4FNF on search for extraterrestrials
1:18 MFSK32: Photo of Gemini Observatory
1:12 MFSK16: Closing announcements
0:16 Surprise mode of the week*To make Flmsg work with Fldigi (both can be downloaded from w1hkj.com), in Fldigi: Configure > Misc > NBEMS — Under Reception of flmsg files, check both boxes, and under that indicate where your Flmsg.exe file is located.
As always, reception reports are much appreciated and should be sent 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.
Radio Free Sarawak is back on the air!
Thanks to Rob Wagner’s blog, The Mount Evelyn DX Report, I just learned that the clandestine station, Radio Free Sarawak, is back on the air after declaring a break on May 8, 2013 (see our previous post).
Radio Free Sarawak will broadcast daily from 11:00-12:30 UTC on 15,420 kHz.
The following is the press release from Radio Free Sarawak‘s website (via their Facebook page):
AUGUST 11, 2013: Press release, Radio Free Sarawak back on air from Monday
Sarawak’s independent radio station Radio Free Sarawak is back on air Monday 12th August following its holiday recess.
The rural radio station, which broadcasts mainly in Iban, but also in Malay has received numerous enquiries from listeners eager for information about pressing issues in the state, including the on-going plans to dam key rivers and evict thousands of native people from their lands.
“The state government has moved swiftly to try and take advantage of its dubious election wins by tripling Ministers’ own salaries (back-dating the increase by a whole year and a half) and pushing through further land grabs in native territories, including the proposed Baram Dam region” points out the UK based station head, Clare Rewcastle Brown. “Ordinary folk want to be heard on these issues and it seems their opinions may often be different from the propaganda put out on the state controlled licensed media, which only promotes the narrow interests of the super-wealthy and politically powerful”.
Radio Free Sarawak is the 2013 winner of the prestigious Pioneer of Free Media Award by the International Press Institute, which applauded the station’s efforts to bring freedom of information and freedom of speech to the isolated communities in Malaysia’s Borneo rainforest state.
The station’s call-in facility also provides an opportunity for longhouse dwellers to express their own views and concerns about the effects of deforestation, oil palm plantation, rural poverty and endemic political corruption. The radio station is linked to the online portal, Sarawak Report, which shares the same agenda to shine light on these and related issues.
Radio Free Sarawak is transmitted from London and its familiar team of DJs will be broadcasting from Monday on Short Wave 15420kHz from 7pm-8.30pm local time Monday-Saturday.
It is also available via podcast online www.radiofreesarawak.org , from where it can be downloaded via smart phone for mobile listeners or onto UBS sticks for car radio.
The local call-in line is 082-237191 and listeners are invited to get in touch with their comments and issues.
HackRF: open source SDR on Kickstarter
HackRF prototype (Source: ossmann.blogspot.com)
Michael Ossmann is making a business out of developing and producing open-source hardware.
His latest creation is called HackRF, and in less than a day, it has been fully backed on Kickstarter raising over $290,000 US with 25 days left to go in the campaign (at time of posting). Backers can contribute to this campaign with some confidence as Ossmann has successfully delivered products from Kickstarter in the past.
What makes HackRF unique is the fact that the stand alone unit can operate between 30 MHz and 6 GHz; a frequency range substantially wider than any SDR currently on the market. Indeed, when combined with the Ham It Up converter, the HackRF will also cover HF bands and lower.
Additionally, HackRF is a fully open-source transceiver; applications are limited only to a developer’s imagination. You could potentially use HackRF for ham radio, radio astronomy, scanning, shortwave radio listening, remote control applications, wide band monitoring, and commercial/industrial applications. If you use two HackRFs in tandem, they’ll even work in full-duplex applications.
Though the project is fully-backed, you can still support HackRF in the Kickstarter phase and save a bit on the eventual retail cost of the unit. Production units are expected to ship early 2014. Check out the HackRF Kickstarter video below:
Additional information:
- Check out HackRF technical details and development notes at the HackRF wiki.
- Source code and hardware design files are available in the latest release packages or in the git repository.
- Keep up to date with the latest project information by following HackRF on Ossmann’s blog.