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Author Topic: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?  (Read 2197 times)

KA3VID

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #15 on: January 30, 2023, 08:26:57 PM »

<slow clap>

I was wondering when someone would point out the historical comparisons between the previous "end-of-days" debates (AM vs SSB, tubes vs transistors, code vs no-code, etc, I think he got most of them) and the current FT8 vs all-other-modes ridiculousness.

If anyone hasn't read all the 'historical documents' written by Cass WA6AUD (and later added to by Paul VE1DX) they probably should.  His perspective on DXing is the closest thing there is to a DX religion.

73
John VE8EV

Edit: Here is the link to the original West Coast DX Bulletin archive.
https://ncdxc.org/west-coast-dx-bulletin/ 
Cass would close each issue with his unique take on DXing (and make a plug to subscribe to the bulletin!)

This will probably piss off a lot of people but oh well. I think the WAS award should be awarded for mode of operation. IOW if you got your WAS using FT8 then it should be noted. If you got it using phone and CW it should be noted. It's a lot harder to achieve the WAS award using phone and or CW because let's face it FT8 is done using a computer program. Also before you get your feathers ruffled I don't have a hatred for FT8 it's just a different mode. If that's your thing,have at it. That's all.
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W2IRT

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #16 on: January 30, 2023, 08:42:51 PM »

Who said anything about autonomous stations? That strawman argument is getting tiresome. It still takes the operator to select the station he/she wishes to call, or initiate the CQ routine.
I suggest you take a look at what is out there for download and what it can do because you obviously do not know what out there.

I got news for you. My software of choice is WSJT-Z. It has "That Feature" in it if I choose to use it. Guess what. I don't. I toyed with it a few times at first just for fun, but it served no useful purpose, plus using it means those contacts are not valid for ARRL-sponsored awards. But what that software does so beautifully is allow me to filter out unwanted regions, countries, or states with a lot of granularity. When a band is hopping I can stop seeing spots for stations I don't care about (usually Europe, the US, Canada, and South America) and just see when stations from Africa, Asia, and Oceania start popping up. When the JAs are in hot and heavy I can turn on a filter to see anything in Asia except JAs so I can focus on the more exotic ones like 9M2, 9M6, 9V, YB, 9N, etc, or else I can leave 'em there and fill up my log with dozens upon dozens of JAs that I select manually (usually selecting those who call me with a report rather than a grid square), without seeing all the 'merkins and Europeans chasing them.

When 6m is open, again, I get rid of the US/Canadians when there's an international opening to Asia or Europe, or get rid of certain individual states when I'm hunting for known-active and needed grid squares out west. Z-mod is great for all of that, even if I don't use "that feature" to fill up the log. I strongly disagree with the idea that most users are running full-auto.
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Night gathers and now my watch begins. It shall not end until I reach Top of the Honor Roll

Great times are at hand, and soon there will be DX for all—although more for some than for others.

WO7R

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #17 on: January 30, 2023, 08:46:38 PM »

Quote
IOW if you got your WAS using FT8 then it should be noted.

WAS has a huge number of mode specific awards.  Including FT8.

If you qualify, you can simply bring up the awards display and claim it.
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WO7R

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #18 on: January 30, 2023, 09:06:01 PM »

Oh, and it should be noted that I got my Triple Play Award (WAS on CW, SSB, Data) without realizing it was supposed to be hard.

Not only did I have to do WAS on all three modes, all participants had to confirm on LOTW.

It is, I suppose, not a finger snap, but a couple of contests and a bit of time on FT8, plus maybe even a little RTTY contesting and I had it.

There's lots of WAS oriented contests out there and contesters are pretty hard over on LOTW these days.
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K0UA

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #19 on: January 30, 2023, 09:19:03 PM »

<slow clap>

I was wondering when someone would point out the historical comparisons between the previous "end-of-days" debates (AM vs SSB, tubes vs transistors, code vs no-code, etc, I think he got most of them) and the current FT8 vs all-other-modes ridiculousness.

If anyone hasn't read all the 'historical documents' written by Cass WA6AUD (and later added to by Paul VE1DX) they probably should.  His perspective on DXing is the closest thing there is to a DX religion.

73
John VE8EV

Edit: Here is the link to the original West Coast DX Bulletin archive.
https://ncdxc.org/west-coast-dx-bulletin/ 
Cass would close each issue with his unique take on DXing (and make a plug to subscribe to the bulletin!)

This will probably piss off a lot of people but oh well. I think the WAS award should be awarded for mode of operation. IOW if you got your WAS using FT8 then it should be noted. If you got it using phone and CW it should be noted. It's a lot harder to achieve the WAS award using phone and or CW because let's face it FT8 is done using a computer program. Also before you get your feathers ruffled I don't have a hatred for FT8 it's just a different mode. If that's your thing,have at it. That's all.

And what about us triple play holders?   Triple Play number 1995 here.
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73  James K0UA

KD8MJR

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #20 on: January 30, 2023, 09:29:48 PM »

Who said anything about autonomous stations? That strawman argument is getting tiresome. It still takes the operator to select the station he/she wishes to call, or initiate the CQ routine.
I suggest you take a look at what is out there for download and what it can do because you obviously do not know what out there.

I got news for you. My software of choice is WSJT-Z. It has "That Feature" in it if I choose to use it. Guess what. I don't. I toyed with it a few times at first just for fun, but it served no useful purpose, plus using it means those contacts are not valid for ARRL-sponsored awards.
---Snip--
 I strongly disagree with the idea that most users are running full-auto.

So your admitting that an Autonomous station is not only possible but very real and you have one available to you?
You just finished saying it was a Strawman argument!

You may not be using it but why do you think others are not?
How is the ARRL going to know?  Do they have some sort of Magic Ball that is separating out those who are awake and manning the Mouse versus those that have it on Autopilot working contacts?

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N5PG

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #21 on: January 30, 2023, 09:38:03 PM »

And yes, there has always been a chorus of suggestions to delete some places because of inactivity and likely future inactivity but the goal has never been to delete legitimate entities as defined by the DXCC criteria (or change the criteria) simply because of current events.

So Kingman Reef was deleted, no argument there but what about Scarboro' Reef ?

Does it even still exist ?
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KC0W

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #22 on: January 30, 2023, 09:39:16 PM »

WAS has a huge number of mode specific awards.  Including FT8.

 Speaking of WAS..............My small accomplishment in this silly amateur radio game. (taken from my QRZ page. click on to expand)

 

 Someday if I ever move back to the mainland I wanna add 60 meters CW to my WAS tally. Thus bring it to 12 band CW WAS. 


                                                                             Tom KH0/KC0W
« Last Edit: January 30, 2023, 09:46:38 PM by KC0W »
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KD8MJR

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #23 on: January 30, 2023, 09:47:14 PM »

This will probably piss off a lot of people but oh well. I think the WAS award should be awarded for mode of operation. IOW if you got your WAS using FT8 then it should be noted. If you got it using phone and CW it should be noted. It's a lot harder to achieve the WAS award using phone and or CW because let's face it FT8 is done using a computer program. Also before you get your feathers ruffled I don't have a hatred for FT8 it's just a different mode. If that's your thing,have at it. That's all.

Of course it's a lot harder with SSB and CW but with FT8 you can actually get one while your sleeping or playing a round of Golf!  That is why they will never admit that it's lazy and easy.

I have the same concerns as you.  I would not care about FT8 if it was a separate award, but just watch how fast the FT8 traffic would die down if they handed it out as a separate worthless FT8 Award.
The ARRL knows this hence why it's included.  If everyone is getting a Trophy then the Trophy maker makes a lot of money.
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KK2DOG

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #24 on: January 30, 2023, 09:49:34 PM »

If it aint spark-gap...it's just CB radio.  ;)
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WO7R

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #25 on: January 30, 2023, 10:14:27 PM »

Quote
Of course it's a lot harder with SSB and CW

WAS?  A basic, all-band WAS?

Get serious.  A good contester can expect to do that in a weekend.  Heck, they have a yearly "clean sweep" cup they sell for the ARRL Sweepstakes.

So, two good weekends and a week on FT8 and you have it.
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W2IRT

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #26 on: January 30, 2023, 10:38:33 PM »

So your admitting that an Autonomous station is not only possible but very real and you have one available to you?
You just finished saying it was a Strawman argument!
I'm saying that mass quantities of full-auto contacts are almost certainly not happening. Yes, of course some folks are running automated, and I'm pretty sure I've run across a few on 6m last summer—endless CQing for 45 minutes overnight, failure to complete calls and going into a 10 minute loop, that kind of thing. When I was playing with it myself I noticed that happening on occasion. I never left it unattended and maybe made 100 or so QSOs that way, probably more as "proof of concept" than anything else. It's buggy and prone to hiccup, plus it's not legal if you let it go unattended. I'd have never once claimed any credit, naturally, but that wasn't an issue since I think I just worked a bunch of stateside or easy western EU stuff on 20 when it was chock-full.

You may not be using it but why do you think others are not?
Like I said, I have no doubt a few folks are using it, and a subset of them are possibly claiming awards off it, but I believe that number is miniscule bordering on statistically insignificant. It's non-trivial to accomplish if you're not fully computer-literate. Have I worked a 'bot? Probably, but I have no idea if the station I called is automated or not, and 99% of the time the QSO progresses normally. If everybody was running bots the problems would become very obvious in short order. When I was experimenting I don't think I got more than 5 or 6 QSOs worked before it started acting up and I had to manually halt TX or change macros, etc. I don't think automating the software is stable enough for use by the hordes and masses. And I can't see the point, quite frankly. I like the mode because it has error correction so no more ESP contacts as I claimed back in the RTTY days.

My wife loves playing Bejeweled Blitz in her down time and I kid her about it sometimes, but she saw me manually working FT8 one afternoon and she said it wasn't much different, and by jove I think she's right. It's a great time killer when I have nothing to do.
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Night gathers and now my watch begins. It shall not end until I reach Top of the Honor Roll

Great times are at hand, and soon there will be DX for all—although more for some than for others.

K1VSK

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #27 on: January 31, 2023, 05:22:42 AM »

And yes, there has always been a chorus of suggestions to delete some places because of inactivity and likely future inactivity but the goal has never been to delete legitimate entities as defined by the DXCC criteria (or change the criteria) simply because of current events.

So Kingman Reef was deleted, no argument there but what about Scarboro' Reef ?

Does it even still exist ?
Scarborough exists on current nav charts of that area so there is no reason to assume it doesn’t exist. Whether or not it should have ever been added to the DXCC list is a separate matter and already thoroughly debated.


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VK3HJ

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #28 on: January 31, 2023, 05:42:00 AM »

And what about us triple play holders?   Triple Play number 1995 here.
I decided that WAS Mixed, or WAS on most of the bands was going to be too easy, even from VK. So, my first WAS I applied myself to, and applied for was 160 m WAS. Then, I knocked over the Triple Play (#2471). I looked at the myriad of mode-specific WAS awards, and none of that interested me.
As for "Golden Days", I think I had more fun during the last Cycle as I was working "new" countries regularly. Even with a much more capable station, I feel like I've hit "The Wall", with little or no progress. I tick off new Band Countries weekly, but mostly with FT8. I need a shower afterwards.
In another thread, someone remarked about no high band DX at night. I'm sitting here at half-past midnight, and 10 m is open to Europe and Asia, as are pretty well all the bands. Nothing I want though. The difference is, I have a good station in a rural location, not a wire in a HOA.
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WO7R

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Re: The Golden Days of DXing or the End of Days?
« Reply #29 on: January 31, 2023, 06:22:56 AM »

Quote
Scarborough exists on current nav charts of that area so there is no reason to assume it doesn’t exist. Whether or not it should have ever been added to the DXCC list is a separate matter and already thoroughly debated.

When I google it, it is usually called "Scarborough Shoals" these days which implies that it may not be above the waterline.  But, that's just a word.

Even so, boats are not just interested in islands. They are at least as interested in places where some damn rock does not quite break the surface, especially if there is a long, extensive collection of these that the hull would scrape.  They amount to submerged oceanic mountains or continental shelf extensions that are not quite reaching the surface.

I'm not sure that something being a on navigation chart proves it meets the arcane ARRL definitions here.
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