Grrr…. It’s been a very frustrating morning. I recently tore down my entire amateur radio setup in order to bring in a new desk. I have all of the equipment hooked back up and all the radio gear is working, but the software… Arrgghhh…
When I get on the air I generally use one of the digital modes like PSK31. Doing this requires a computer and software to code/decode the digital signals. It’s not that hard to do. Or at least it shouldn’t be.
I have the computer, Rigblaster, transceiver and everything else connected properly. I’m using the exact same computer and software I had running before. All the settings in the software and transceiver are exactly the same. Nothing at all was changed. And before I did the tear down, everything worked just fine and dandy.
Now, though? Of course not. Even though I changed nothing, I can’t transmit for some reason, and it’s driving me nuts. The software settings are the same. The cable connections are the same. The radio equipment is the same. Everything is exactly the same as it was before the tear down.
Only it won’t transmit now for some reason. Spent almost two hours this morning trying to trouble shoot the problem, and have come up with a blank. I’ve checked the software settings, the equipment, everything. Nothing seems to work.
Receive is just fine. I have complete control of the transceiver from the computer. It receives, decodes digital signals, everything. But transmit? Nope.
The transceiver goes into transmit mode. The software seems to be working properly. But there’s no signal actually going to the transceiver.
I remember that I had the exact same problem when I first set this all up some three years ago or so, and it drove me crazy then. And, of course, I can’t remember how I fixed it.
Sigh…
grouchyfarmer 
Wow sounds like a hum dinger of a problem. I am reluctant to suggest – is there a solder joint that went bad when it got moved around?
LikeLike
Now that’s something I didn’t think of. The RigBlaster has a plug in module inside to configure it for different transceivers. That could have have come loose. Or the cable going from the RigBlaster to the microphone connector could have an issue. Well, no, that wouldn’t be it either because it’s working with the RigBlaster set to VOX rather than COM so the connector and wiring must be okay because the RB is triggering transmit that way. Has to be something with the RigBlaster itself. I’ll open the case up tomorrow and check the module and see if there was a cold solder joint or something.
On the plus side, I have to admit I rather enjoyed spending half the morning trying to trouble shoot this problem. I got so involved in it that I lost track of time. And I had some success. I didn’t get it configured right, but at least I got something working .
Sometimes I think I have more fun trying to figure out why things don’t work than I do actually using the equipment, if that makes any sense.
LikeLike
Are any of the connections USB? I know I had a VOIP headset that could not be swapped into different USB ports on the laptop without reconfiguring the software. It didn’t work like a USB mouse where I could switch from left side of laptop to right side.
LikeLike
I do think it’s something with the USB setup. There are two USB cables. One goes from the transceiver to the computer for rig control and that seems to be working fine, the other goes from the transceiver to the RigBlaster, which then plugs into the mic input of the transceiver. It’s entirely possible that something in the setup on the computer was changed by Windows 10 when everything was disconnected because I was still using the computer for other things. I did get something working. After a lot of experimenting I finally got it to trigger the transmitter in the VOX mode on the Rigblaster. Even that took considerable experimenting. That is working at least, and PSK Reporter website reported that the monitoring network out there is picking up my signal. I can continue using VOX, but not being able to use the COM port to trigger the transmitter is bugging me and I’m going to keep trying to trouble shoot it.
LikeLike