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Author Topic: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?  (Read 722 times)

KW4CQ

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Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« on: February 18, 2023, 09:49:49 AM »

Which DX cluster works best for dxing from North America?  Does one give a geographical advantage to NA over any other cluster?
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K1VSK

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Re: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« Reply #1 on: February 18, 2023, 11:54:37 AM »

Spends entirely on how you set the filters and what filters are important to you. The variation between filters of the networks is minimal. They all share the same data.
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NU1O

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Re: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« Reply #2 on: February 18, 2023, 12:31:52 PM »

Which DX cluster works best for dxing from North America?  Does one give a geographical advantage to NA over any other cluster?

My experience is the same.  The data is the same.  I use Dxheat.  I set it to the band and mode I'm working and just allow spots from North America.  It does what it's supposed to do.
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N5CM

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Re: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« Reply #3 on: February 18, 2023, 07:38:52 PM »

I use DX Heat and DX Summit.  On occasion one will have spots the other one doesn't have.  DX Heat also indicates if the target station uses LoTW or not.

I look for DX I don't have confirmed and states I don't have confirmed on 12 and 17 meters.
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ON6AB

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Re: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« Reply #4 on: February 19, 2023, 02:31:33 AM »

I think the VE7CC cluster software has a lot of nice features.
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W0RW

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Re: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« Reply #5 on: February 19, 2023, 06:35:41 AM »

i use the VE3SUN program.
 http://ve3sun.com/
It contains a list of all the DX countries i have worked and ignores them.
It only notifies me of all the ones i need, (which are few).
Plus i can block any LIDs and false reporters.
Like i block any one who posts idiot calls. ID1OT.
It has a lot of bells and whistles i don't use.
Paul   w0rw
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W0RW

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Re: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« Reply #6 on: February 19, 2023, 07:10:37 AM »

   i  also use these sites to find out where and when someone is operating.
Enter the callsign into the 'spotted' block.
https://beta.reversebeacon.net/index.php

http://www.dxscape.com/search.html
Input the wanted call sign into the 'search data base'.

paul  w0rw
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ON6AB

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Re: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« Reply #7 on: February 19, 2023, 09:24:37 PM »

And then there is Spot Collector from the DxLab suite which you can use as a stand alone app.
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KD8MJR

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Re: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« Reply #8 on: February 20, 2023, 10:14:26 AM »

The problem with the Cluster is the inaccuracies and of late deliberate incorrect spotting.  You depend on the cluster at your own peril.
Just Today on 10M 17:30Z they had EZ5EBL (Turkmenistan listed).

I went there and the guy was working a huge Pileup.  He was a strong 59 Plus with me, so that was instantly suspicious.  Then a quick listen and I realized that it was IZ5EBL.    Okay so it was a harmless spotting mistake that probably set off a few thousand Alarms but then I noticed that no matter how many times his call sign was corrected both on the air (by other) and in the cluster.  Someone would come back right away and list him again as EZ5.
The Pileup was huge most seemed to be having a hard time hearing him and I think a lot of people thought they just hit into the miracle ATNO.

The other issue is deliberate incorrect spotting frequencies on CW stations.  I am not talking about someone posting their Tx Freq by accident.  I am talking about posting the DX as being 3-5KC lower than their actual frequency.  I interpret this as the Big boys in CW letting each other know the Dx is there if you turn the knob and can listen for it, but lets throw a misdirect at the CW decoder type guys and send them in the wrong direction.

We also have some rare ones that are listed by callsign but the person forgets to add the /mm to the spot.  So tons of guys log him not even realizing he is on a ship at sea.

« Last Edit: February 20, 2023, 10:24:12 AM by KD8MJR »
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“A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.”  (Mark Twain)

W2IRT

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Re: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« Reply #9 on: February 20, 2023, 10:55:50 AM »

My frustrations with the cluster go back at least 20 years. Sadly not a lot has changed in that time, and DX Summit is one of the worst offenders. The issue is a balance between a spot flood vs improved accuracy. When I first started out I just picked the physically closest cluster (trying to avoid latency problems), and put in a few rudimentary command line filters from a complex set of options. This proved unwieldy after a while, and soon Lee VE7CC created his CC User program, which allows painless GUI-based changes. What's more, using the latest version of the software, you can connect multiple clusters and it aggregates the feeds, which is neat.

Less well known that his CC User software is Lee's actual cluster software called CC Cluster, which is a competing product to AR Cluster and Linux-based DX Spider clusters. Why is this important? CC Clusters allow even more granularity of filtering as well as turning spots on and off on a band-by-band basis based on the time of day, based on your inputted location details. Since CC Clusters are paid software there aren't many people running it, but Lee has been running his own cluster on it for years, and by default that's the cluster I use even though it's thousands of miles away from me. It's just that reliable! Almost no downtime, and it automatically rolls over to another CC Cluster when it is down.

So I have typically three clusters connected this way, and in turn that feed is available to DX Lab's Spot Collector and N1MM. Spot Collector itself is good, but I prefer feeding it from CC User. Of course spots are still very much a case of GIGO (garbage in, garbage out), but this process has been helpful.

I would strongly back the creation of a "Cluster 2.0" network with fully authenticated user accounts and sysadmins who are not afraid to block abusers.
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AA6YQ

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Re: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« Reply #10 on: February 20, 2023, 07:21:58 PM »

All spots eventually reach all clusters, but clusters closer to a spotting station often report that station's spots more rapidly than clusters farther away. Sometimes, the difference can be as much as 30-60 seconds, which is enough time to QSY and make a QSO before the cluster hordes arrive on frequency.

That's why I recommend that DXers who rely on chasing cluster spots connect to a cluster on the North American East Coast, a cluster on the North American West Coast, a cluster in Europe, and a cluster in Japan. Connecting to multiple clusters also protects you from missing a needed spot because the one cluster to which you are connected went down or became inaccessible.
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KW4CQ

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Re: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« Reply #11 on: February 21, 2023, 07:28:34 AM »

At the suggestion of several OT's here I downloaded the 30 day shareware version of the VE3SUN cluster spotting program and I am currently cruising throught all of its nifty features, some of which are not included in any of the other popular spotiing programs I've previously used.  One of the features (as reported above by Bob W0RW), that I really appreciate now is havig the ability to selectively block out all of the LIDs, false reports and foul language  that showed up while I was using DX Summit during the recent FT8WW and 3Y0J dxpeditions.   In the meantime, while evaluating the VE3SUN program, I am reverting back to using my old friend, the VE7CC.cc cluster.  I strongly endorse W2IRT's suggestion that we need a "Cluster 2.0" type network with authenticated user accounts.  Free speech on the internet aside folks, I don't know about the majority here, but I for one am getting sick and tired of seeing anonymous/fake  callsigns and derrogatory comments posted on many of these DX clusters.  A change for the better is way overdue.   
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W0RW

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Re: Which is the best DX cluster for North American use?
« Reply #12 on: February 23, 2023, 06:41:16 AM »

Also,  i use VE3SUN's software to block out originators who make mistakes.
If  w1xxx spots VU4X, i don't block VU4X, i block out w1xxx.
Any future spots sent by w1xxx will be blocked.
Paul  w0rw
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