Needless to say, I was VERY excited! I have a rather modest setup: A K3 driving an ALS600 and a Hex beam at only 32 feet. I have been looking for S21 for many years, and never heard any of the previous operations. I keep a photo album of all the unique entities, and hopefully S21XV will be in there. The ONLY country I've worked and not received a QSL from was LU3ZY, Anibal, on South Sandwich Islands from way back in the late 70's. I've tried, but no hope on that one. Guess if I count that one, the number is 351, but because I think it's a lost cause, I usually leave it out. The only one left that has action right now is the JD1 on Minami Torishima. Heard him once, but no luck. Maybe?
 Work them first, and worry about DXCC status later. Should count, but guess you can never tell. Glad to put this one aside in any case. It sure took a major effort on this old DX'ers part. Been chasing them since 1963...

73 ... Jim K8CXM

Been trying to get him for 4 days now, on 20 and 17 CW and yesterday on 20 RTTY with no luck. But, FINALLY broke through with a CW contact on 17. Only S21 I have ever heard. He was overall #351! But, wonder if I can get a QSL. Any suggestions?

Thanks Jim K8CXM

I also worked this guy on 17, and I think he was a pirate having some 'fun'.

 Got lots of 5A QSLs from way back.

73 ...

I've been using a Rascal with my TS2K and OLD Gateway laptop for several years, and it works perfect. PC soundcard could be your problem.

I agree with Tom, as long as you are able to get the dipole up high enough. Figure for best results, at least 1/2 wave length above ground for a dipole. I have used a variety of verticals and dipoles, but keep coming back to dipoles,even though at times, some of my verticals do work better than the horizontal dipole. My biggest complaint with verticals is the increased noise with verticals. A/B tests (subjective) seems to give less ambient noise to dipoles by at least 2 S units, yet signal strength isn't much different. I even had a 30M half square (2 above ground phased upside down verticals) that got out very well, but the received noise level drove me back to a dipole on 30M. No doubt the half square got out very well, but sometimes weak signals were just too hard to copy. Not so with the dipole.
 But, always work with what you have. Any antenna is better than no antenna.
  73 ... Good Luck