After an absence of a few years (very, very busy!), the radio fever has reappeared. You put down activities for a short while, and before you know it, several years past! Every time, when a radio magazine passed by, or a Facebook post from a friendly amateur appeared on my timeline, the adranaline started to boil again and I simply had to return to the hobby.
Just before the radio hobby fell asleep, I had a lot of fun with Dstar and I bought two DMR radios. With this I had already made a number of connections. The hotspots I used (DVAP and DVMega on a Raspberry Pi) also worked great. There were only a few repeaters and both digital ways of comunication seemed to be very popular.
This time it was different. After cleaning up the shack and dusting of equipment, the internet told me I was very out-of-date! The radio's and hotspot were using outdated firmware and the used codeplugs were totaly unsuitable in 2020! Also the gathered knowledge on Dstar and DMR were gone, so I had a lot of catching up to do.
First I started gathering knowledge. Unfortunately I found out that Dstar is not used as much and that it is certainly not as popular as DMR. Because it is still being used, I read lots of Dstar info on the net, updated the equipment and made some connections again. Software used by the hotspot is much better these days and Dstar on this side works fine again!
DMR, on the other hand, is a completely different story. At the time of writing, DMR is booming in the Netherlands. In the past you had to discover a lot on your own and with lots of trial and error you tried to master the material, nowadays it is made much easier for you.
There is a lot to find on the internet to start with DMR, but I want to mention 1 site to visit which is a must for the reader. On the '
DMR Techno Round forum' you will find everything to make DMR your own and all necessary information is neatly arranged under several topics. A number of amateurs (Rutger - PA3CQJ and Carel - PA3EHA) ensures that everyone is provided with the most up-to-date code plug. It does not matter for which radio, a plug is often available or can be manufactured within short term!
Others take care of the latest news or solve problems that occur every now and then. Als many how-to's can be found for many brands. For many issues or problems that you experience, another has probably preceded you and there is a chance that the solution can be found here. All this is supported by the DMR Techno Round on Thursday evening at 20:00 CET on TG2015 TechnoTalk.
In this way, starting / re-boarding becomes very easy again!
