[Elecraft] [K3] K3/0 Remote Rig QRQ / QSK performance

[Rick Tavan N6XI]

Mitch is an expert. Heed his advice. I'm just a user, bumbling my way
through my first weeks with RemoteRig and a pair of K3s. Here is what I've
found:

QRQ QSK that sounds like a local K3 doesn't seem possible. The latencies
inherent in the Internet will wipe out all of the space between elements
and most of the space between characters. You may hear something between
words. At 30-35 wpm I can use QSK but there are enough keying artifacts to
make it more like "the (bad) ol' days" than the beautiful, clean QSK we
have come to treasure. This isn't really the fault of the K3 or Remoterig.
You simply have delays in the system that are similar in duration to dits
and dit spaces.

Your dual-path operation sounds like nearly full duplex and may work just
fine. If you transmit on one channel and listen on the other, then you
should hear everything the other party sends, even while you are key-down.

All this being said, I have enjoyed semi-QSK immensely with Remoterig.
Given the inherent latencies, the operation is much smoother than I
expected. I turn the Remote K3 MON level down to zero and listen to the
local monitor tone generated inside the Remoterig Control RRC. Yes, you
hear that tone whether you use the keyer inside the RRC or an external
keyer or computer connected to the RJ45 "I/O" jack on the back of the
Control RRC.

I've done one contest remotely - a CW Sprint - and was satisfied with the
experience. I was severely handicapped in both power, antennas and number
of rigs (one instead of SO2R) compared to my usual Sprint operations. I
look forward to the next Sprint when I expect to have full power and
rotatable antennas. (SO2R should be possible with two control rigs but I'm
not planning to set that up.)

Set your expectations appropriately and you will enjoy remote operation
with K3 and Remoterig. Expect more than physics can deliver and you'll be
disappointed.

73,

/Rick N6XI


On Thu, Sep 19, 2013 at 11:55 AM, W5UXH <Chuck.Broadwell at gmail.com> wrote:

> Thanks for the interesting comments so far.  I guess it is difficult to
> get a
> clear picture without "hands on", but I have wondered about this for a long
> time.
>
> Regarding latency effects on QSK, I have a daily qso with a friend,
> typically at 60 wpm, where we are basically operating two paths in
> parallel:
> 20M RF and an "internet CW" VOIP path.  The total latency for the full path
> from each of us through the server to the other (he is in Berkeley, CA, the
> server is in San Jose, CA and I am in southern NM) is such that one of us
> can listen to the "real time" RF path and the other can listen to the
> internet path or we can both listen to the internet path and it is easy to
> forget which path you are listening to.  Of course if one of us pauses,
> intending to continue, the other may start to respond resulting if a brief
> doubling of a character or two, but with the full QSK in the K3 and the
> full
> duplex on the VOIP path, this is not a problem.
>
> Mitch mentions an external keyer can be used which is what I would require,
> so it is good to know that.  Does the RRC still generate a local sidetone,
> with that audio mixed in the RRC with the remote audio, and the remote
> sidetone turned off?  David mentions the remote sidetone "will drive you
> nuts", but hopefully it can be set to zero.
>
> A third reply (offline) commented:  "On CW I can hear the band between
> characters at 25-28 WPM but I would think when you approach 30-35 WPM you
> wont hear much band.".  Perhaps this is with the "slow" CW mode, not "CW+".
> I would hope that the remote audio coming back would have the same CW+ QSK
> performance that I experience at 60 wpm.  The QSK does degrade a bit
> starting at 65 wpm, but is excellent up to that point.  Above 65 wpm, the
> QSK is "variable" depending on the exact stream of characters being sent,
> it
> is a bit strange actually.  I think Wayne has said this is not the case if
> you send a string of dits using the internal keyer at 80 wpm, but with an
> external keyer things are not quite the same.  Still I am very pleased with
> the CW+ mode performance up to 65 wpm.  At 70 wpm, I actually prefer the
> VOIP path, but it is very rare to be pushing that hard, and we usually do
> not even creep up to 65.
>
> Thanks all,
>
> Chuck, W5UXH
>
>
>
>
>
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-- 
Rick Tavan N6XI
Truckee, CA