Birdies

[Randy Johnson-8]

I have had trouble with annoying “birdies,” notably at 14014 and 14029.  I
hope my experience in chasing these down helps someone else with a similar
problem.



I finally traced this to an interaction between the cable modem for my high
speed cable Internet access and the network card on my computer.  When I cut
power to the modem, the birdie would stop.  When I unplugged the CAT 5 cable
at the computer, the birdie stopped.  When plugged in and when I cut power
to the computer, it was still there because when a computer is “off,” not
all circuits are off, and whatever the reason the birdies were still there.
I tried switching to DSL as provided by the local phone company but the
problem was still there.



It may well be that there are more expensive network cards that would not
have this interaction but I did not want to fool around with them. I had
noted that I did not have birdies while using a laptop in the shack.  So I
tried a cheap wireless card, similar in function to the ones used with
laptops except that you plug it in to one of the slots on your PC.  The
birdies went away but the thing was incredibly slow, worse than a 56K modem.
So I bought a more expensive Linksys wireless card with a “speed
accelerator.”  No more birdies and the Internet speed is consistent with
high speed access. I should point out that the literature provided with this
card says that the accelerator works only with machines running Windows XP.



Randy W6SJ.

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[Trev - K6ESE-2]

Randy,

Did you try using shielded twisted pair CAT5E or CAT6 cable? This solved it
for me. Just an idea...

73 Trev - K6ESE
----- Original Message -----
From: "Randy Johnson" <[hidden email]>
To: <[hidden email]>
Sent: Friday, July 15, 2005 3:03 PM
Subject: [Elecraft] Birdies

>I have had trouble with annoying “birdies,” notably at 14014 and 14029.  I
>hope my experience in chasing these down helps someone else with a similar
>problem.
>
>
>
> I finally traced this to an interaction between the cable modem for my
> high speed cable Internet access and the network card on my computer.
> When I cut power to the modem, the birdie would stop.  When I unplugged
> the CAT 5 cable at the computer, the birdie stopped.  When plugged in and
> when I cut power to the computer, it was still there because when a
> computer is “off,” not all circuits are off, and whatever the reason the
> birdies were still there. I tried switching to DSL as provided by the
> local phone company but the problem was still there.
>
>
>
> It may well be that there are more expensive network cards that would not
> have this interaction but I did not want to fool around with them. I had
> noted that I did not have birdies while using a laptop in the shack.  So I
> tried a cheap wireless card, similar in function to the ones used with
> laptops except that you plug it in to one of the slots on your PC.  The
> birdies went away but the thing was incredibly slow, worse than a 56K
> modem. So I bought a more expensive Linksys wireless card with a “speed
> accelerator.”  No more birdies and the Internet speed is consistent with
> high speed access. I should point out that the literature provided with
> this card says that the accelerator works only with machines running
> Windows XP.
>
>
>
> Randy W6SJ.
>
> _______________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> Post to: [hidden email]
> You must be a subscriber to post to the list.
> Subscriber Info (Addr. Change, sub, unsub etc.):
> http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/subscribers.htm
> Elecraft web page: http://www.elecraft.com 

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