I finally had enough downtime to move my WB4SON-10 Winlink Gateway over to its full-time hardware:
- Alinco DR-135T Mk-III
- Samlex SEC-1223BBM Power Supply with battery changeover
- 100 AH Solar Charged battery
- ACEPC AK2 miniPC
- Master’s Communication DRA-50 interface with Alinco 6-pin adapter
Power measurements of the entire system indicates it pulls 22 watts from the AC mains. Of course that load is on 24/7, and that works out to about $3 a month in electricity.
Left to right: Power supply with DR-135 on top, red box is the DRA-50, miniPC
I just got this radio abd will like to get me DRA-50 for sound car as already usig signalink for the Vara HF….. a little confuse abut the min 6 pin adapter mentioned for the DRA-50, the cable i have for the readio is serial port for the rear of the radio and the end of the cable is phone type connector that went into the signal link….the end connectors in the DRA-50 appears to be usb type connectors???? just want to know what cable I need for the radio to connect to the sound card board>?
73
kd4jwf
Hi Jose,
I hate to say it, but it depends on your radio. A few mobile type VHF/UHF radios support a 6-pin DIN connector which is used for PTT and audio in/out. Using a radio like that is about the only way to get the highest possible speed, as the audio in/out on the DIN is direct to the discriminator/modulator without any audio filtering. Not so of the mic and speaker outputs. A few Kenwoods and Alinco radios have the 6 pin DIN connector. Of course newer HF rigs usually have a built in sound card these days that you connect via USB. So you don’t need a DRA-50 if you are using a rig that has that like an IC-7300/IC-9700 (most newer ICOM rigs).
73, Bob