One of the really well-done and useful technologies available today is the Universal Serial Bus (USB). If you don’t know what this is, you have been living under a rock or simply refuse to own a computer. The first revision of the USB spec (USB 1.0) was released in January of 1996. The standard has been revised and improved over time and USB ports are now standard on virtually all computers today.
USB has become the preferred and standard method for connecting electronic devices to a computer. Yes, there are some applications that might require a different connection such as IEEE-1334 (AKA Firewire), but for the most part the world has embraced USB.
In my collection of electronic stuff, I have quite a few devices that use USB. Let’s see. The computer mice that I use with notebook computers all use USB. My Garmin GPS, my digital camera, my Apple iPod, my external hard disk and my keychain Flash memory drive all have USB. The really cool thing is that I can just plug these devices in and they pretty much work. Sometimes the first time you use a device, you may have to load the right driver. On subsequent connections, it just works.
Then there is my ham radio equipment: all stuck in the archaic world of RS-232. You remember RS-232….it’s that 9-pin D connector that might still be on your computer. My newer computers don’t even have it anymore but some of my other ones do…which is the problem. If a manufacturer wants to be backward compatible with older computers (like the ones that many of us hams still have lurking in the basement), you need to support the “old” serial port.
If you have a newer computer without an RS-232 port, you can’t connect it to brand new ham equipment. Now, the good news is that there are adapters that convert the new USB port to connect to older RS-232 equipment. See an example of one here. My experience is that these converters really do work but they require some setup to get it right. Instead of the device self-identifying (like a USB device would), you have to specify the right COM port, the right serial speed, the right parity bits and so forth. Why did we ever have to set parity? Why couldn’t it just always default to a common setting?
USB is also very fast, with USB 2.0 running at 480 Mbit/s, compared to maybe 115kbit/s for RS-232. USB also supports hubs and addressing of multiple devices connected to one USB port. RS-232 was pretty much a “hook up one thing at a time” bus.
The point here is that it is time to move on. Come on, ham radio manufacturers, forget the old RS-232 ports and give us USB. Bring ham gear into the 21st century.
73, Bob K0NR
Hey Bob,
It’s been a while.
USB in ham gear. It’s a matter of economics. There are some good new things with USB out there by some of the smaller companies. The new USB TNCs from SCS in Germany are killer. The new VHF/UHF product is even competitive in price. There are kits like the TNC-X from John Hansen W2FX. And there is the new RigBlaster Plug-and-Play from West Mountain Radio, a soundcard interface like they should have been all along. There are more, too. But none from the big three, except a few offerings.
Some D-Star gear from Icom has USB for rig control, and ethernet for data. That’s a step up.
I am leading the building of our high-speed data network across our county. I have found that the average ham is living in the past regarding technology, and still votes with his wallet for things like serial ports. Besides hams being an exceptionally small and specialized marketplace for electronics, that is what retards forward motion.
Further, the lemming-effect is present. Even a forward- thinking-ham will purchase a $400 TNC and a new VHF radio for 1200 baud packet instead of $500 for a PAIR of plug-and-play 900 MHz Ethernet data radios with 1000 times the throughput (avalanwireless.com). Other hams around are using the old stuff, so even new money follows the old. It’s tough to break the cycle!
There is hope. Vote with your wallet. Convince your friends to do the same.
Hope we run into each other again sometime soon.
73,
Lor W3QA
Hi Lor,
Good to hear from you.
I have to agree with you on how many of our fellow hams have a strong bias towards an economical solution (which is to say “cheap”). This is definitely a factor in the slow adoption of USB.
On the other hand, I am not ready to let the manufacturers off the hook either. USB is well established in the computer industry and virtually all of the other adjacent electronics markets have adopted it. It is time for the ham equipment manufacturers to get moving.
73, Bob K0NR