WSJT-X not decoding. I am seeing signals in the WSJT-X waterfall; clock seems accurate

Gregory Stobbs

WSJT-X not decoding. I am seeing signals in the WSJT-X waterfall; I can send CQ and getting RF out; the clock seems to be within 0.2 secs of accurate. The incoming signal strength is between 40 and 6 dB. Could this be a software glitch induced by Windows 10? When I say it is not decoding I mean absolutely NOTHING is decoding, whether JT-65, JT-9, FT-8. I'm using a Flex 6700 with version 2 software.

Bob K8RC

Make sure you are using USB or DIGU.  

If you use LSB or DIGL it will cause the problem that you describe by inverting the phase of the recovered signal from normal.

David

If that isn't it I have found that uninstalling the DAX drivers (or all flex software), reboot, and reinstalling has brought digital modes back to life.  Many will say that is overkill but I spent a lot of time toggling and checking setting to find the brief 5 minutes to uninstall reinstall got it going.

Bob K8RC

He says he is seeing signals in the WSJT-X waterfall.

If DAX wasn't feeding audio the signals would not be seen in the app's waterfall.

David

yes I have had the same thing happen. It is frustrating because everything looks like it should be working. Waterfall shows activity but nothing decodes. I uninstalled, reboot, reinstall and it decodes. I spent a lot time before doing that checking settings, making sure there was another program running that might causing a conflict, etc. So just saying it doesn't time must time to just flush it out and start it over. It could also be worth uninstalling the wsjt-x software at the same time and reinstall with a fresh download. The configuration will stay in place. Everyone has their own solution.

Chris DL5NAM

Reduce audio input level

WK2Y

One oddity I have noticed is that you have to tune ransmit momentarily before decoding occurs.
73, Bob WK2Y 

WA2SQQ

Working here. Just got off 160 working several European stations. Sounds like it’s going to e a good night!

NX6D Dave

I would send the question to the WSJT-X developer's email reflector.  Their point of view will be oriented toward their program as long as it can be shown that the signal is reaching the program.  Our point of view is sorta the opposite.  We can advise about getting the signal into the program, but after that, we don't know any more than anyone else, except the WSJT-X experts.

Information about how to join that reflector can be found at www.wsjtx.net.

Bob G W1GLV

I believe you have a clock anomaly. I had the same problem but it was due to clock synchronization.
I installed the Meinburg clock software that Ria suggested. Problem went away. GL

Al K0VM

I have seem my WSJT stop decoding after a period of time.. Usually fixed by closing and restarting the DAX GUI, WSJT-X and/or the radio..  For me it is likely to stop decoding if the CPU is heavily loaded..  I do run Meinburg for clock sync.
AL, K0VM

WA2SQQ

So after one of the recent Windows 10 updates I had to reinstall Meinberg. All back to normal.

Rick Hadley - W0FG

WSJT-X drops radio control of both my radios (6400 & 6500) every few hours.  With the current version of WSJT-X I'm running  (set up under Flex 6K control)rather than Kenwood) it requires a reboot of the computer to get it back.  I haven't seen an occurance of it just stopping decoding without losing connection to the rigs.  I run Dimension4 for sync.

Ria

That is a bug in hamlib I think. I have seen that as well. I switched to TS2000. 

Ria

There are a few things I have noticed that  will cause WSJT-X to stop decoding:

1. DAX stream is corrupted. Basically if you listen to the audio it is stuttering or distorted. This is a known issue I believe. Restart DAX app and it will come back. 

2. Your PC doesn't have enough horsepower to run DAX and whatever else you're running. I have seen one case where when the person started up Teamviewer that DAX started to stutter. Teamviewer is very expensive with CPU. DAX is very sensitive to CPU usage.

3. Bandwidth and default filter for DIGU. Somehow for some reason Flex decided that the default filter for DIGU should be set to 1kHz centered on the channel. This doesn't work well with nearly all digital modes and with WSJT-X you will miss decodes. Set your bandwidth to 3kHz. 

In cases 1 and 2 you will still see the signals on the waterfall. In case 3 you will see them in narrow bandwidth.

Ria

WK2Y

More a work around than a real solution, I have been running JTDX and it runs all day with no issues.   Seems to decode more signals per pass the WSJT-X. There is also a JTDX Alert to go with it.
73, Bob
WK2Y 

K4MT

Your not running PSKreporter web site?  I have had a problem with PSKreporter website by some unknown reason stopping the WSJT decode. It happens almost immediately when I run that site. I found by turning off the grey line overlay the problem goes away.

Before you say it I have  a fast computer with lots of resources and when this problem is happening  I have low CPU and Mem use.

This seems to happen most when using Chrome browser.  Not saying this is your problem but thought I would bring it up.

bahillen

I am having the same problem with my new 6600, WSJT-X, JTAlertX with one instance of WSJT-X. The more programs that are running the worse it gets. After reading the above discussion I was decoding on 20m missing a 15 segment once in a while. When I closed chrome it stopped dead in its tracks. I monitor the CPU and see that the CPU jumps significantly when starting up Chrome or doing some things. WSJT-X does not like it when the CPU hits 100% even for a short time in the cycle. My computer is a Dell Laptop (old) I5 3210M 2 core 4 virtual CPUs with turbo boost. Often it just stops decoding and even closing and reopening WSJT-X doesn't restart, sometimes after restart is decodes a couple cycle and stops completely. 

I did stop and restart DAX and it came back to life even though the audio streamin and the WSJT-X waterfall continued to show normal audio. The audio levels on DAX and WSJT-X waterfall don't change. Looking at new computer but that won't help the DAX what ever is going on there. The decode is either all there or nothing.

Your post and replies from others has given me a good insight to what is happening. Great help.

73 Bill W9JJB

Sam

I was trying to run wsjt with a "netbook". 1.6gzh atom chip with 2gig ram and it would not decode. Maybe got 10 decodes in an hour. Tried another and it did the same. Put on a real laptop i3 and 8g ram and it took right off.

Sam kf6vik

Art, N4PT

Sounds like a clock issue. I have tried a number of the clock setting programs and finally settled on BitTimeSync by IZ2BKT easy to use and works fine. Tried Meinberg but it seemed a bit complex and overkill. 

Rick - W5FCX

For me it was time sync issue. Just right click on the Windows clock and configure its Internet time to sync with NIST NTP time source and all is good!

Greg N8GD

That works for the moment, but, by default, Windows Time updates once weekly. The hardware clock in your PC will be far too inaccurate before the next weekly update. You either need to modify your registry to update Windows Time more often or install a time updater like Meinberg or Dimension4.

Rick - W5FCX

Great point.  Thanks for that tip, Greg.  Oh the joys of Regedit... haven't used that one in a while.  Found this article helpful and set the sync interval to one day (86400 seconds):

https://www.wikihow.com/Change-the-Time-Synchronization-Interval-in-Windows

(I used CurrentControlSet instead of ControlSet001 which I believe is a prior version.

Thanks  again!
Rick

Tim - W4TME

Also, Windows does not use NTP, but SNTP.  The differences can significant depending on the intended use.  NTP reaches a very high level of accuracy and avoids abrupt timesteps as much as possible by using different mathematical and statistical methods and smooth clock speed adjustments, SNTP can only be recommended for simple applications, where the requirements for accuracy and reliability are not too demanding.

I use Meinberg because it is a true NTP client based on the UNIX implementation of NTP.

Ria

I agree fully with Tim.  Think of it like a car that pulls slightly to one side. You can either **** it back every 2-3 minutes or apply constant pressure to keep it steadily tracking along the center. Which one is better? NTP is the latter, not the former. Windows and Dimension 4 are SNTP. I only recommend D4 as a last resort when Meinberg can't be installed. 

Rick - W5FCX

Thanks. I'll keep that in mind if FT8 ends up back in the ditch

Greg N8GD

Rick,

If you're going to go the registry route with Windows Time client, I would suggest that you set the update interval to one hour, or 3600 seconds.  The PC's hardware clock can drift more than 2 seconds in 24 hours, and anything beyond 2 seconds will be problematic.  That was the error limit on JT9, but I'm sure FT8 requires even tighter accuracy (probably something around 500 msecs or less) since it does everything in 1/4 the time of the older versions.  Really, as others have mentioned, Meinberg is your best bet!

Rick - W5FCX

Excellent suggestion, Greg.  I changed it to 3600 seconds.

I tried Meinburg but there was some COM port conflict and it just seemed easier to leverage the built-in Windows time client, which should suffice now with the more frequent updates.

Thanks!

Tim - W4TME

You loaded the wrong code because Meinburg does not use a serial port.
https://www.meinbergglobal.com/english/sw/ntp.htm#ntp_stable

Load the monitor too
https://www.meinbergglobal.com/english/sw/ntp-server-monitor.htm

Rick - W5FCX

Thanks Tim. That worked.

Tim - W4TME

Glad to be of assistance.

Now my second bit of NTP wisdom...

Use at least 4 NTP servers and use the pool servers in your region that randomly select stratum 1 and 2 public time servers.

I use:

0.us.pool.ntp.org
1.us.pool.ntp.org
2.us.pool.ntp.org
3.us.pool.ntp.org