Failure to Connect

Bob N8KVC

I was able to finally get my hands on my new 6400. I had ordered it in March (My birthday) and had it shipped to my uncle's house. I was traveling and am finally able to pick it up. Because I am not at home, I wanted to connect directly to the radio and play with my new toy.

With the cat 6 cable that was in the box, I wired the computer directly to the radio. Every time I started SmartSDR, it would disconnect in a minute or less. Sometimes just a flash before the disconnect warning box would show. Tried an old computer with the same result.

Then hardwired the radio into the wifi router and was able to connect with the old HP laptop via wifi. It connected quickly and showed 5 green bars and 2ms latency just sitting idle. My newer LG Gram laptop uses an adapter for ethernet to convert to USB-C. Not a good thing. The old HP (very slow) has the standard net plug.

So what the heck is wrong? Why can't I connect directly from the laptop to the radio? It is not the cable as several were used to eliminate them as the problem. Is this a radio problem or a software glitch? I am at the bottom of the learning curve for this new radio and trying to learn as I start playing Radio. I've done cold starts, factory reset, etc.

Are laptops a problem for hardwiring? Does anyone have any thoughts?

KD0RC

Hi Bob, it sounds like the radio is OK. Is it a factory new one or did you get it used? If used, I would do a factory reset and see if it behaves differently. To factory reset it, turn the radio off, then press and hold the power button until it turns white, then release it and wait for it to turn solid green. Try the direct connection again to see if it works.

If it is factory new, start it up using WiFi and take a screen shot of the Network tab of Radio Setup (under Settings menu). Here is what mine looks like:

John KB4DU

The direct cable usually works right away. If the hp laptop connects to the radio via WiFi, the radio is good. So something else needs attention. DHCP is probably on in the router if WiFi works.

Next step might be to connect cat 6 cable from hp laptop to router and flex to router by cable. shut down and restart flex to let the router supply an IP address. Shutdown and restart hp laptop to get an iP address and then start SmartSDR. Let us know what happens.