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PSK (Phase Shift Keying) SOUND CARD interface program � demonstration took place at the club on THURSDAY 11th March . Unfortunately only one contact took place, this was into Slovenia on 40mts with about 5watts from a FT817 (de David G1MAL) into a homebrew vertical (de G0KUF). However the principle was shown to work which was the main object of the evening. If your interested in trying data modes then please send an email to the club and I will help you set a system up. Both RTTY and PSK31 digital modes can be used with just a soundcard in a PC coupled to the Mic and speaker sockets (or line-in Line-out) of your PC. Software is available from a number of sources but MMTTY must be the best for RTTY and I use Logger (logbook programme) for PSK. David uses Mix. They are all free!

Anyone can operate RTTY. You don't have to know how to touch type to run RTTY. Every program I know for RTTY includes special "buffers" which hold pre-typed messages that can be sent by pressing a function key or clicking a button on your screen with a mouse.

RTTY is baudot code. More specifically, on the Amateur HF bands, it's 5 bit baudot meaning that every character consists of five bits, either mark or space. The standard mark and space tones are 2125 Hz and 2295 Hz respectively. Although these standard tones are used by most Amateurs, it's possible to operate RTTY using other frequency tones. This is fine as long as you maintain the standard 170 Hz shift (2295-2125 = 170 Hz).