[NLRS] Wanted to Buy

Tue Jun 25 15:13:24 EDT 2019

Police cars usually have a laptop mount either where the transmission hump
used to be or slightly into the passenger area. Usually it is something
like a very heavy-duty goose neck with a shelf on top for the laptop. Take
a look on Ebay or Amazon for "laptop mobile mount" and you'll get a variety
of cheaper ideas. One of the easier ideas is probably the model that has
legs going under the seat with a table top above the bench seat. You could
probably bend that out of EMT conduit for almost nothing.

Personally, I don't like the laptop on the seat since that usually puts it
more in the sun so the screen is hard to read. I always liked having my
radio's control head above the rear view mirror since it was mostly out of
the sun. I keep wondering if I could mount a 7" or 10" tablet to the visor
so it folds up out of the way. That might actually work better if you use a
7" or larger HDMI video display on the visor and plug it into a laptop
under the seat. Might also be interesting to use a Raspberry Pi 3B+ as the
computer, with the HDMI display and a wired or wireless keyboard and mouse.
That kind of system is halfway to running as a remote ham station. I'm not
a touch-typist so the constant up-down of my head for screen and keyboard
might be a fail.

To solve the accurate time problem, you can buy a "GPS USB" device for $3
to $15 on Ebay and run a utility program that uses it to set the laptop
time and even get your location. As Jon said, the laptop time needs to be
accurate within a second or two. If you set the laptop time on Friday via
the Internet, it should still be close enough on Sunday night. I would
recommend you test this by setting the time on Friday, shutting off the
laptop until Monday, and then run the time set routine again to see how far
off it is. Try the <time.is> web site to check and set the time via the
Internet. Although I'm not sure if that sets the hardware time too. You
must shut off the laptop to make sure the hardware clock is accurate for
reboots.

73, Doug Reed, N0NAS.

On Tue, Jun 25, 2019 at 9:38 AM Jon Platt via NLRS <nlrs at mailman.qth.net>
wrote:

>
> Hi Mel I have two lap tops.  The first one is a (very) old but physically
> small Gateway with a Intel Atom N270 processor.  Its probably classified as
> a "netbook".  Its 10" x 8.5" and sits on my lap very nicely when used in my
> rover/mobile.  This is the laptop that I have used for many years with N1MM
> for mobile HF contesting; MNQP, WiQP, KSQP, etc.  I love it for that.
> However, its probably underpowered for WSJT-X.   My second laptop is a Dell
> Inspiron 15.  Its physically bigger as it has a full keypad, perhaps its a
> "big" laptop, with a 15.6" screen and running Windows 10.  It runs WSJT-X
> well, no problems.  While the larger screen is nice for viewing, it doesn't
> sit on my lap as well in the mobile/rover, but I can manage.  I used this
> in the June contest to make maybe 30 or so FT8 Q's from the rover.  I do
> have my "Display" set for 150% thus making WSJT screens easier to see
> (i.e., larger).   For time, I did not have my GPS working so I set the
> laptops time using WWV ala listening to 10 MHz from my FT897.  With a
> little practice you can get better than 1 second accuracy which is good
> enough for FT8 (but maybe not MSK144) and it seemed to hold this accuracy
> for the full weekend.   Note with Windows 10, you do not have control of
> the clocks "seconds" setting if you try to change time via the normal right
> click on the time ... it only allows you to enter hour and minute and
> seconds is whatever it is.   To control hour, minutes, AND seconds requires
> that you to do this via the Control Panel, then Clock and Region, then Set
> the time and date, then Change date and time, which gets you to the clock
> control format that is similar to Windows 7.  YMMV. 73,
> JonW0ZQ  -----Original Message-----
> From: Melvyn Larson via NLRS <nlrs at mailman.qth.net>
> To: nlrs <nlrs at mailman.qth.net>
> Sent: Mon, Jun 24, 2019 11:31 pm
> Subject: [NLRS] Wanted to Buy
>
>
> I had good success with FT-8  on 6 M during field Day making about 40
> contacts with
>
> a borrowed Acer 10-14 inch Laptop. Needed Binocular Nagnifier for Weak
> Eyes tosee the calls to double click on them. I need a laptop of my own.
> Can it run on Windows with the screen Magnifier ? or does it have to be
> Linex ?
> Would be interesting to hear what kind of Laptop setup is working for
> othersin NLRS.
> Think I can buy a shelf that fits over the steering wheel for when I am
> stopped.
> Mel KC0P/R
>
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