JS8Call with Gregg K6XSS

Published 2021-07-23
As a relatively new ham, Gregg K6XSS found interest in FT8 as a weak signal communications protocol. However, while FT8 is a powerful tool, the brevity of the contact procedure led Gregg to explore a bit deeper and found JS8Call.

“It takes the robustness of FT8 mode and layer on a messaging and network protocol for weak signal communication on HF with a keyboard-to-keyboard interface.” (js8call.com/)

Gregg's natural curiosity prepared him for this presentation, as he admits he is not an expert. This is an excellent teaching experience for anyone interested in learning something new that extends your computer to your amateur radio hobby.

All Comments (15)
  • @barndweller4573
    Thank you for sharing this video from your club. I will be installing this software.
  • @jps99
    Thanks for this great video. Most I've come across explained the setup but did not actually show the program in use. Gregg did a great job despite his newness to the software.
  • @tubeDude48
    What's a "Grid Locator"? He's needed to learn more about JS8CALL BEFORE this presentation !! He didn't know SNR!?
  • @thecarys563
    Saved to my radio playlist to watch later. Want to learn more about operating JS8CALL, as opposed to just setting it up. I made a SOTA contact with it but want to get smoother at using it.
  • Great video. As Gregg stated, I found almost no one on the JS8 freqs. Have yet to make a full QSO on JS8. Hopefully your efforts will pay off with more folks on JS8. My main complaint with FT8/FT4 is that it is so impersonal as to be questionable as a true QSO. Thanks!
  • @ThePoplarReport
    I am very interested in this. I will get my 20m and 40m up maybe in Nov. I’m in Pittsburgh.
  • @Annytiek
    did you hear about the improvements made to js8call (specifficly the the API) ? opened up a ton of possibilities
  • @briand9513
    Nice video. JS8Call is pretty cool, but man it is soooo slooooow.. it takes over a minute to send a sentence? I used to use FSQCall which is much faster, can send and receive images, and has "sounding" which is similar to the heartbeat feature.. I've been monitoring 40m FSQ freq (7104mHz) but no sigs there anymore. Pretty sure people suffer through the slowness of JS8Call just so they can be part of the whole FT8 crowd.
  • @5cyc
    I have been working ft8 recently just getting my feet wet with JS8call
  • @agampungo
    Where can i download JS8 software..TNX
  • @1shARyn3
    FT8 isn't that robust (watch the forums.) JS8, unlike FT8, doesn't crash.
  • I’ve found that the JS8CALL data throughput speed is very slow, even at the faster data rates. FT8 gets boring quickly, because it’s semi-automated. hello/goodbye QSOs. Decades ago, I used AMTOR, which is extremely robust. AMTOR has error checking, and could get through when no other modes could get through. PSK31 is a poor substitute for AMTOR, since it’s nowhere bad robust and doesn’t have error correction. Unfortunately, g try he popularity of AMTOR died decades ago. Dave KY0L