INFO: Pure wired networked radio isnt radio at all

Now, for clarity, pure networked radio - that which it’s traffic is solely sent/received over TCP/IP without any kind of RF gear involved isn’t radio communication at all.

So you could make an a tangible semi-plausible claim of exception if your emulated radio client communicates over a radio link to a network such as wifi/Bluetooth/cellular/Lora or any other RF based telegraphic transmission out of the usual accepted radio transceiver concept, but unless your working access points at long to extreme ranges or struggling to work out of a proverbial RF 'black hole‘, you can’t really say your ‘radio‘ experience is anything like that of people who actually have a very fallible comms link that’s needing some actual thought to set up right, requires effort on your part to use beyond network setup and installing an app.

What pure networked radio is, essential, is nothing more than a VoIP based DV ‘mode‘ that’s really no more than a voice enabled IRC type arrangement that has (usually) little or no functionality without a hosting server and backbone links. I admit there are variants (obscure ones) that are p2p and/or mesh based, that actually use networked RF adaptors so also tangibly are more radio than non-RF setups.

But ultimately, there’s no skill getting your long distance contacts etc some network radio users claim makes them real DC operators therefore real radio users.

I had to ensure one such American relating how awesome he was for working the world on a DVMega standalone transceiver, after trying to claim that I’m a loser for bothering with antennas, transceivers etc and actually logging real DX without networked links. Sure I use WiresX and DMR gateways to chat worldwide at times, but I’m not arrogant enough to align the zero effort of that as comparable to having worked really distance directly. I keep working DX for achievement and satisfaction gained from having got there for actual DX communication.

I’m not condemning ’network radio‘ users, it’s their choice and I can’t blame anyone casually interested in expanding their window on the world taking a cheap accessible shallow learning curve approach. Just don’t be the fool like that idiot fake DXer was in his delusions of being an awesome radio op and you’ll be respected for your level of interest.

NR and RoiP has it’s value and role, and occasionally actually serves a practical purpose outside of budget LMR style comms use, just keep it in context for what it is and you‘ll get along OK with traditional radio users - after all, for the radio user who’s struggling to get their hotspot running on, your RoIP type experience may

My friend is having great fun with the N60 4G radio I sold him. He’s never been interested in ham radio, and he’s my age, so a newly to any kind of microphone. He is, though, a clever computer person. His work address has no cell coverage, not even 3G because it’s inside a steel building with the nearest cell installation 2 miles away. Inside he can access the network, but he’s fitted a wireless repeater for his LAN so he can sit in his car in the car park and get into the inside wireless network. So he’s into cables, antennas and connectors. His car radio now works when he parks up. He is happy. How is this not radio? It’s just different radio.

You clearly failed to notice I did say there were tangible arguments for why use of RF access to what is networked dependent RoIP can be counted as radio usage, for which 3G/2G cellular device based RoIP/PTT/POC can count. The separating difference between those and full radio with bolted on hotspot/repeater access networked use being that what is universally recognised radio transceivers are capable of functioning fully independently of any network and still be simplex/duplex (where radio allows) over a distance, so still function primarily as a completely standalone radio comms system.

It’s no different to why a teleprinter or Telex direct connected STOFOR type TP box is real land teleprinter based Telex, despite on being dependent on additional terminal equipment to access, the basic distinction being that the TP or TP wired line connected ‘STOFOR’ type setup exists as physical TP terminals and a physically TP server that ultimately directly communicates over an established and accepted conventional TP network not by accessing an IP or BBS/Data Modem user over phone line to run via an emulated TP server gateway that eventually links to destination physical TP/‘STOFOR’ equipment.

Ditto the same distinction reason why use of soft ‘fax over IP’ isn’t real digital Group 3 fax usage, it’s merely an emulation of that and requires an additional even more fallible Internet access provision to be nowhere near as resolutely near bombproof as real Group 3 fax systems are in practise. Where real G3 equipment is very optimised to simply work and only quit a job at hand when the route threshold falls to a point where transfer is nil to ■■■■■■ all (the equivalent of an totally unusable SNR condition in RF), ‘soft‘ fax using IP depends on two or three fallible intermediate mode of transmission and intermediate fallible links and subsequent equipment before it can even attempt a mere point to point facsimile exchange and a fourth liability if you count the computer the soft fax over IP client depends on to even function. Real fax equipment and non-ip based ‘soft fax‘ that communicates over a phone line via a hardware fax TNC equivalence or a data modem using a phone line to direct send to a destination fax machine of either non-IP source is easily ‘real‘ by default because it exists in a standalone built for a sole dedicated purpose.

Cell phones, whilst possessing and depending on real RF equipment to ultimately do their real primary role are tangible real radio in the sense they require and use RF and a purpose built RF exchange system (yes, cellular systems can locally communicate in a repeater style local access only mode is setup to do as a fallback using IMEI based identity like how you use direct IP reference on IP systems when DNS resolution dies), even if they can’t directly do direct p2p local comes link setup over radio.

So the distinction of where radio based synthetic ‘radio’ systems count as real radio in the long established radio communications sense is ultimately defined by their direct point to point capability to direct establish communication to other radios directly where range and prevailing conditions allow for when no radio repeater relay exists under the same conditions.

You see, there is a clearly defined line in the sand between radio and radio via IP and telegraphic use of telephone or IP networks doing the heavy lifting.

And if it never uses radio equipment in any shape or form to route/connect you via EM over the air at any level, it’s absolutely not radio no matter how you dress it up.

So, subsequently, 'DX‘ operation in the radio world context only is validly claimed for what you achieve when you use simplex point to point actual radio communication as an operator and when an radio listener exchanges a radio report via other means to the heard operator/station. You can argue until the sun dies where the boundary really absolutely lies between DX and local communication as a boundary set in stone as a benchmark, but what qualifies as a DX achievement via listener or operator by an exchange of at least the exchange of station information and acknowledgement of contact or report of having heard on-air exchanged by other means is DX, not talking to the world over gateways and IP.

A distinction a lot of today’s gen of radio users and IP-only users either are blind to see or can’t grasp because they are the modern day equiv of my old club’s ‘JM’ radio veteran.

I can manage to make the distinction and know which of my QSO exchanges are true DX or not just as I can tell by tale tell audible artifacts of transcode and DA conversion signature characteristic signs without looking at what I’m using between if I’m hearing AV/DV radio comms and emulated radio over IP gateway traffic.

In fact, if there was no clear ‘real’ distinction between use of RF based radio of any kind and non RF based exchange of communications, the whole license business would have been rendered irrelevant and pointless as absolutely unnecessary decades ago.

Sure, like I said about making your Ham Radio hobby what interests you about it in another topic, if your friend enjoys his chosen method, fair play, but when that kind of user starts doing what the idiot I mentioned starts doing, running people who actually earn their true DX operator status or start calling us losers for being stupid enough to use actual radio equipment to work the world instead of lazy-assed DX claim fakery achieving ‘DX’ by IP traffic over the internet, that’s equivalent in my book as declaring war on radio users and employing the same kind of blind arrogance as ‘JM’ (referring to veteren ham who’s the Satan of ham radio) in a way that’s inexcusable.

If there was any doubt of what’s real radio or not, just remember that all the critical communications that have survived disaster and given the world the insight to what’s going on and kept the support disaster ground pounders in real time knowledge of the bigger prevailing situation relied on and still relies on actual conventional radio usage not IP gateways and cellphone tech RF devices and software only fake radio DV communicator software clients.

And why that’s the case shouldn’t need defining as it’s common sense stuff.