Echolink ~ Virtual Amateur Radio!?

Amateur radio without any transceiver

   People can get an amateur radio license or a call sign without any transceivers in the United States.  It is different from some other countries such as Japan.   I used to have a call sign in Japan.  However it requires to have a transceiver in hands.

   I do not know the situation in other countries, however just comparing a law in Japan, the cost to get a call sign in the United States is much lower than Japan.   The cost in the United States is just a fee of the exam.  As long as people pass the exam, they can get a call sign shortly without any transceivers in hands.   However, people need to spend for exam, all registration, buying transceiver and etc.  The total cost will be more than a several hundred dollar. 

Echo link ~ Virtual Amateur radio!

    That is the background of the licensing system in the United States.   Now, today’s topic is “Echolink” which is a sort of VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) such as Skype, Google Voice and etc.  The primary difference is that all users must hold a valid amateur radio license.   Also, people can access through a repeater which has the internet connection from a hand-held transceiver.   It is something similar as Skype / Google voice link to a public phone network.   Echolink uses amateur radio instead of the public phone network.

   This is not a new technology.  It was introduced sometime after I stopped amateur radio around 2000.  If we search this on the internet, there is a log of information showing up.   As I mentioned that I resume amateur radio recently and I am trying catching up the recent amateur radio world and I found it.   Since all users are amateur radio license holders and it seems like a typical amateur radio communication.  Therefore, I feel like this is a “Virtual Amateur Radio”, just replacing a real transceiver with a smart phone or a PC.

I have just tried it!

    It seems to be very interesting and I tried it.   For detail information, there are many information on the internet.   I just briefly introduce the overview.   The software can be downloaded from Echolink Site.   For Smart phone, it can be available on AppStore or GooglePlay.   One tricky thing is that it requires a public IP address and IP address which is assigned through WiFi or router is not public address.  Thus you might need to setup a proxy.   Installation itself is very simple and you need to register with your call sign, email address and password.   Then they probably ask to show the proof of the license.  In my case, I just needed to send a copy of my license and it was activated in a short time.

   Once your account is getting active, you can see many users all over the world.  I think number of the users in the United States is the largest.  I also see many users from Japan where is my home country.   I tried to listen some conversation on conferences and repeaters.  One of stations found me and I had a chance to talk a station in Japan.   The communication is really the same as what I did in my old days. 

   I have not tried to use it through a local repeater.  It is possible to send DTMS command to repeater to link the repeater over echolink and communicate wherever I want to talk through a small hand-held transceiver on V/UHF.

Easy to start!

    I just share my experience, but back to the original topic, it is really possible to start Amateur Radio without any transceivers in the United States.  I think that is a big thing.  Since the internet / smart phone are very popular nowadays, therefore without any extra cost other than the exam fee, people can start Amateur radio without spending much money and time.  This is really cool!

   The issues when I started amateur radio when I was a kid are “a large amount of money” and “setting up antennas”.   There are a lot of registration process / fee with buying a transceiver to get a call-sign in Japan.   Also setting antennas are a lot of limitation for the space especially HF bands.   Since HF antenna is usually large due to longer wave length in limited space in typical Japanese residence.  Therefore I guess many people compromise to pick V/UHF instead of HF for smaller antenna or just having a hand-held transceiver for outdoor use.   So, talking with station oversea is very difficult for many people.

   A good thing for Echolink, it is very easy to get into Amateur Radio World and communicate all over the world.   All stations are not on Echolink, however there are still many station you can see on Echolink from many different countries.   It is a good experience to communicate with them without a lot of effort / investment.   It is probably just USD $15 in the United States if people can pass the exam for the first time since the internet, smart phone and PC are very common nowadays.

   The exam is easy.  I do not believe it requires really special knowledge to get Technician class.  Just a basic rule, unit conversion, simple calculation with ohm’s raw and memorize some words.   It can be pass if people get correct answers more than 26 out of 35.   Just memorize the answer of the question pool which have a little more than 400 questions.

    Echolink is probably a good entrance to Amateur Radio World.   Also, there is some low cost hand-held transceivers are available on Amazon in the United States I already mentioned in my past posting.  I think people could start amateur radio with really minimum cost and I guess it is a good thing people may try.