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Mode Saving

Opathy
Opathy Member ✭✭
in SmartSDR for Windows

I have a 8600 using the latest software. If I’m on 75 meter AM and switch to 40 meters by using the “Band” button the radio stays on AM even though the last time I was on 40 meters I was on LSB. It doesn’t do this all of the time but it seems to act like this frequently when I change bands. Shouldn’t the software remember the mode last used on each band?

Comments

  • Mike-VA3MW
    Mike-VA3MW Administrator, FlexRadio Employee, Community Manager, Super Elmer, Moderator admin

    There are 2 way to change bands.

    If you sent a computer / cat command to move to 40m, then something called persistence is not involved. You are destroying the Slice and building a new one and the mode, AM, stays the same.

    If you move to 40M by pressing a Band button in SmartSDR, then it should go back to 40M as you left it.

    73

  • Opathy
    Opathy Member ✭✭

    I don’t know what you mean Mike by a computer/cat command to change bands. What I’ve done is while listening on 80 AM I click on the band button on the left side of the software and click on the 40 meters button and it’s is in AM even though I have never used AM on 40 meters. If I switch the mode to LSB on 40M then I can go back and forth between bands and all is well. I wonder what is happening to revert back to the problem issue.

  • KD0RC
    KD0RC Member, Super Elmer Moderator

    Do you shut down your 8600 by using the power button (or REM ON) jack, or do you just shut off your power supply while the radio is on?

  • Opathy
    Opathy Member ✭✭

    Ok, I can explain it better now after playing with the software a bit. If I go to 3.885AM using a memory and then go to 40M using the band button the radio is on AM on 40 M. If i don't use a memory to get to 3885 to begin with the mode will stay on SSB on 40M.

  • KD0RC
    KD0RC Member, Super Elmer Moderator

    Oh, I see. I do all my band switching using profiles. Kind of a pain to set up, but easy to use afterwards. This will give you a sense of how I set things up per band and mode. My call is at the front because I didn't really understand how profiles work when I set them up. I thought I would have a set of profiles and any guest op would have their own. Didn't really work out that way…

    image.png

    What might be easier than the memories is FLex Repeater Spots. Link to info:

    https://community.flexradio.com/discussion/8029504/flex-repeater-spots-utility#latest

    Link to GitHub:

    https://github.com/KD0RC/FlexRepeaterSpots

    Using Flex Repeater Spots, you can have your AM frequencies showing as a spot. Click the spot to go to the freq and mode.

    image.png

    Just click the spot and the radio tunes there just like a DX spot and the mode will automagically change to AM or whatever you want. You can name it anything you want. Note that spaces aren't allowed in a spot name, so I just use underscores.

  • Opathy
    Opathy Member ✭✭

    very interesting

  • marwalk
    marwalk Member ✭✭
    edited June 1

    @Len, KD0RC

    I read through the Flex Repeater Spots manual. Very cool stuff. I already have a workable frequency and mode change capability with the FRStacks Radio Memory tab (and the SSDR native Memory list), but I'm looking for a way to have more precise control specifically of the power level as well. Use case example: I check into the Canadian American net on 7153 in the mornings when I can (and band conditions cooperate). They are dual mode, using both SSB and CW in the same net. I manage that by having one slice on 7153 LSB for voice, and another slice on 7152.3 CW (for the offset). When it's time for me to send CW, I activate TX on the CW slice and have to manually back off the power to 40 or 50w. When I'm done with CW, and back to the SSB slice, I have to bring the power back up to 100w for normal voice operation. It would be great to be able to set the CW slice to be 40w automatically when I activate TX on its slice flag. I have a similar situation with 80m Winlink, as SSDR remembers the lower CW power from a CW net I check into there, and I have to manually raise it to full power (to let the VARA modem control its output) for things such as Winlink Wednesday. Could Flex Repeater Spots do that, or is that even possible?

    Thanks,
    Mark
    AC3EW

  • KD0RC
    KD0RC Member, Super Elmer Moderator

    Hi Mark, I don't think this would be a good fit for FlexRepeaterSpots. The problem is that it would have to watch for mode changes independently of which spot was clicked. Kind of doesn't fit well with the existing code.

    I do have another utility (FlexiCraft Utility) that kind of does what you are after, but requires an Elecraft KPA 500 / KAT 500 combo to work. Let me give it some thought - Maybe a cut-down version of the FlexiCraft Utility would meet your needs.

  • marwalk
    marwalk Member ✭✭

    Hi, Len. The FlexiCraft Utility description from your main forum for it (https://community.flexradio.com/discussion/comment/20617425#Comment_20617425?utm_source=community-search&utm_medium=organic-search&utm_term=FlexicraftUtility) seems very much in the ball park for what I'm looking for. Roger your comments about it being limited to Elecraft/KAT at this time. Out of curiosity, I've installed v1.04 of FlexiCraft and it sees my Flex 6600. I also have a TunerGenius that is connected via TCP but the Tuner options on FlexiCraft are limited to COM serial ports on my installation; I would need the ability to connect via the tuner's IP address, although SSDR already does that via the Tuner Genius Utility (I'm running SSDR v3.9.18 but still using the separate tuner utility for the extra precise manual tuning control that provides).

    Let me know if you'd like to continue this discussion here or in the other Flex forum linked above.

    Thanks!
    Mark
    AC3EW

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