Contesting with logging software on a PC (not MAC)

[john lawrence-3]

I'm a return veteran contester with lots of wins using the old pencil log with a dupe sheet.
 
I've tried various new programs attempting to gain a level of comfort so I might consider a serious entry into some contesting again. You should appreciate that I'd hate to feel the pain of getting part way into the contest and be delayed or loose my logs due to a computer freeze, lock out or reboot.

For the past year I've been soliciting "contest guru" opinions and come away with conclusions based on inputs of the long term contersters from my past more active years. My conclusion has nothing to do with the suitability of the wonderful K3 as a radio for CW or SSB contesting.

I'd use a basic mission critical PC with a 386/486 processor, DOS and CT to run the logging process without connection to the Internet during the contest. CT runs with the K3. The more recent contesting software might be ok but Windows is buggy and may crash during the event.

Lets hope System 7 can be configured to offer mission critical reliability in the new PC platforms.
 
Lastly, I find this to be mostly an off Elecraft topic.

Happy New Year

73,
John, W1QS
K3 s/n 2274, K2 s/n 4204

mission critical = power supply with extra wattage, two hard drives with less than 10,000 hrs, shadow write utility and clean fan/filter
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[Barry N1EU]

I beg to differ with whatever input you've received John.  A modern, powerful windows pc is a great investment for ~$1K.  It's not going to crash during a contest, running any of the top Windows contest loggers and will give you loads of enjoyment the other 95% of the time.

73,
Barry N1EU

JOHN LAWRENCE wrote

I'm a return veteran contester with lots of wins using the old pencil log with a dupe sheet.
 
I've tried various new programs attempting to gain a level of comfort so I might consider a serious entry into some contesting again. You should appreciate that I'd hate to feel the pain of getting part way into the contest and be delayed or loose my logs due to a computer freeze, lock out or reboot.

For the past year I've been soliciting "contest guru" opinions and come away with conclusions based on inputs of the long term contersters from my past more active years. My conclusion has nothing to do with the suitability of the wonderful K3 as a radio for CW or SSB contesting.

I'd use a basic mission critical PC with a 386/486 processor, DOS and CT to run the logging process without connection to the Internet during the contest. CT runs with the K3. The more recent contesting software might be ok but Windows is buggy and may crash during the event.

Lets hope System 7 can be configured to offer mission critical reliability in the new PC platforms.
 
Lastly, I find this to be mostly an off Elecraft topic.

Happy New Year

73,
John, W1QS

[John-483]

At 01:08 PM 06/01/10, John, W1QS wrote:

>I'd use a basic mission critical PC with a 386/486 processor, DOS
>and CT to run the logging process without connection to the Internet
>during the contest. CT runs with the K3. The more recent contesting
>software might be ok but Windows is buggy and may crash during the event.

Hi John,

I've been using NA with an old celeron (sp). I've used it single
radio and SO2R, rigs being K2/K2 and K3/K2. I built the switch box
for SO2R, featured in the NA manual (all Radio Shack parts) Never a
problem. No reboots or crashes. the beauty of the old machines is
adding ports, serial and LPT with expansion cards. The SO2R box is a
hands off operation, controlled by a few key strokes, Any questions,
email me. Computers & radio, older is better (for me anyway).

John, k7up
K3, K2's, K1....

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[Don Wilhelm-4]

John,

I have to agree with Barry, but I will lower that $1k price by a lot.  I
have found that Windows 2000 and Windows XP are quite stable.  No
glitches and certainly no "Blue Screen of Death" on any computer worth
it salt.  Yes, Win95, Win 98, and Windows ME did have unstable quirks.
Right now, one can obtain a very good computer in the 2.6 to 3.2 GB CPU
speed range as an off-lease machine for $100 to $250 from TigerDirect
(and possibly other dealers).  I have bought several of the IBM
off-lease computers from them in the last 2 years and have been very
satisfied - most are loaded with Windows XP Pro, although some have XP
Home and others come with no OS loaded (a real bargain for those
interested in Linux Mint or Ubuntu).

So I have to say to those hams who are clinging to their old 266 MHz
computers running DOS or Windows 95 (98), that there is a limit to the
misery that those old computers will create - for myself, I prefer to
move up to at least Windows 2000.  On my home network, I have 2 machines
running Win2K, 3 running Win XP pro and 2 running Win XP Home, and have
not had problems with any of them except for occasional hardware
failures (power supplies, hard drives, and memory failures do happen on
occasion), but the OS has been quite stable since Win 2K (OK, skip Vista
which has its own problems with compatibility).  I also provide support
for our church network running 13 machines on a Peer to Peer network and
the experience there has been similar - Win XP is stable (as is Win2k).  
Windows 7 may prove to be good, time will tell.  Do go to Windows Update
and keep the OS updated to the latest level (turn on Automatic Updates
if you are on a broadband connection)..

If you are slaved to some DOS applications, I highly recommend you stick
with Windows 2000, it runs most DOS applications just fine - or do a
dual boot with DOS 6.22 loaded.

73,
Don W3FPR

Barry N1EU wrote:

> I beg to differ with whatever input you've received John.  A modern, powerful
> windows pc is a great investment for ~$1K.  It's not going to crash during a
> contest, running any of the top Windows contest loggers and will give you
> loads of enjoyment the other 95% of the time.
>
> 73,
> Barry N1EU
>
>
>
> JOHN LAWRENCE wrote:
>  
>> I'm a return veteran contester with lots of wins using the old pencil log
>> with a dupe sheet.
>>  
>> I've tried various new programs attempting to gain a level of comfort so I
>> might consider a serious entry into some contesting again. You should
>> appreciate that I'd hate to feel the pain of getting part way into the
>> contest and be delayed or loose my logs due to a computer freeze, lock out
>> or reboot.
>>
>> For the past year I've been soliciting "contest guru" opinions and come
>> away with conclusions based on inputs of the long term contersters from my
>> past more active years. My conclusion has nothing to do with the
>> suitability of the wonderful K3 as a radio for CW or SSB contesting.
>>
>> I'd use a basic mission critical PC with a 386/486 processor, DOS and CT
>> to run the logging process without connection to the Internet during the
>> contest. CT runs with the K3. The more recent contesting software might be
>> ok but Windows is buggy and may crash during the event.
>>
>> Lets hope System 7 can be configured to offer mission critical reliability
>> in the new PC platforms.
>>  
>> Lastly, I find this to be mostly an off Elecraft topic.
>>
>> Happy New Year
>>
>> 73,
>> John, W1QS
>>    
>

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[Lee J. Imber (WW2DX)]

Hi John,

Welcome back to contesting :)

I have run a fair amount of 24-44 hour tests in the past few years running a 5 year old XP box, N1MM and a pair of K3's in SO2R without incident. The XP box that I use is not used very much and my daily workstation is a Mac. Actually the PC is  tiny Dell dual core that I picked up from ebay for $200. One thing I would recommend is to run your log/db on a USB flash based device, this way if your PC decides to  act up or even worse the drive dies then your log will be safe. This also allows you to quickly move the file to a backup machine.
Remember the box only needs to handle a few tasks during a short 48 hour period, yes murphy can strike and sometimes its PC's and not Radio's :)
There are also a few other technologies other then the flash drive approach, you can get a free 2GB account from http://www.dropbox.com and point your log to your dropbox folder and it will backup into the ether in real-time and you can even have the same dropbox folder on a backup PC ready to go. All kinds of options today for a relatively trouble free windoze contesting experience ;)

Hope this helps and good luck!

Lee
WW2DX.com

On Jan 6, 2010, at 3:08 PM, John Lawrence wrote:

> I'm a return veteran contester with lots of wins using the old pencil log with a dupe sheet.
>
> I've tried various new programs attempting to gain a level of comfort so I might consider a serious entry into some contesting again. You should appreciate that I'd hate to feel the pain of getting part way into the contest and be delayed or loose my logs due to a computer freeze, lock out or reboot.
>
> For the past year I've been soliciting "contest guru" opinions and come away with conclusions based on inputs of the long term contersters from my past more active years. My conclusion has nothing to do with the suitability of the wonderful K3 as a radio for CW or SSB contesting.
>
> I'd use a basic mission critical PC with a 386/486 processor, DOS and CT to run the logging process without connection to the Internet during the contest. CT runs with the K3. The more recent contesting software might be ok but Windows is buggy and may crash during the event.
>
> Lets hope System 7 can be configured to offer mission critical reliability in the new PC platforms.
>
> Lastly, I find this to be mostly an off Elecraft topic.
>
> Happy New Year
>
> 73,
> John, W1QS
> K3 s/n 2274, K2 s/n 4204
>
> mission critical = power supply with extra wattage, two hard drives with less than 10,000 hrs, shadow write utility and clean fan/filter
> ______________________________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
> Post: mailto:[hidden email]
>
> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html

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[Gary Hinson]

> One
> thing I would recommend is to run your log/db on a USB flash
> based device, this way if your PC decides to  act up or even
> worse the drive dies then your log will be safe.

Errr, not if the flash drive dies, unless you meant to use the flash as a backup.  With no moving
parts, flash drives are probably more reliable than conventional hard drives but they are not
immortal and are only rated for so many read/write operations.  Also *all* your local drives of
whatever type may go up in flames if the PC or shack catches fire, or someone may steal the lot ....


> There are also a few other technologies other then the flash
> drive approach, you can get a free 2GB account from
> http://www.dropbox.com and point your log to your dropbox
> folder and it will backup into the ether in real-time and you
> can even have the same dropbox folder on a backup PC ready to
> go.

That's the better option - an offsite backup - if used as a backup, in other words again not the
only copy.  The online file systems are fine if you have a sufficiently fast and reliable Internet
connection, but again I would advise sending backups off-site and retaining one or more local copies
of your log as well, just in case the organization running the offsite system has a technical fault,
or deletes the files, or whatever (trust me: it happens).

You can also take occasional offline log backups onto CD-ROM, or yet another flash drive, that you
physically remove from the machine and place elsewhere in safe storage, far enough away from the
shack not to be caught in the same fire/burglary/whatever.

If that's all too much effort, at least consider uploading your log regularly to Logbook of the
World.  LoTW is a 'last resort' backup since it only stores the minimal amount of info on each QSO,
but at least it is possible to retrieve the basic QSO data if you have no other choice.  This has a
useful side effect of increasing usage of LoTW!

73
Gary  ZL2iFB

PS  This applies equally to Macs and PCs.  And PDAs.  Even paper logbooks are both valuable and
flammable!


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[Lee J. Imber (WW2DX)]

On Jan 6, 2010, at 10:08 PM, Gary Hinson wrote:

>> One
>> thing I would recommend is to run your log/db on a USB flash
>> based device, this way if your PC decides to  act up or even
>> worse the drive dies then your log will be safe.
>
> Errr, not if the flash drive dies, unless you meant to use the flash as a backup.  With no moving
> parts, flash drives are probably more reliable than conventional hard drives but they are not
> immortal and are only rated for so many read/write operations.  Also *all* your local drives of
> whatever type may go up in flames if the PC or shack catches fire, or someone may steal the lot ....
Hi Gary,

No actually I meant use the flash for the actual live log. Flash based drives are far more reliable then traditional platters.
Flash has a life expectancy for ~10K read/writes far less then what would be used in a 24hr contest :)
I have had many platter drives fail in my career and as of to date never had a flash device fail (knocking on wood).

>
>
>> There are also a few other technologies other then the flash
>> drive approach, you can get a free 2GB account from
>> http://www.dropbox.com and point your log to your dropbox
>> folder and it will backup into the ether in real-time and you
>> can even have the same dropbox folder on a backup PC ready to
>> go.
>
> That's the better option - an offsite backup - if used as a backup, in other words again not the
> only copy.  The online file systems are fine if you have a sufficiently fast and reliable Internet
> connection, but again I would advise sending backups off-site and retaining one or more local copies
> of your log as well, just in case the organization running the offsite system has a technical fault,
> or deletes the files, or whatever (trust me: it happens).

I am also a huge believer in off-site backups as well, we are seeing newer technologies like dropbox where it acts more like a local drive then a backup device. I use that service to create corporate wide shared folders across large geographical locations and its been very reliable.

>
> You can also take occasional offline log backups onto CD-ROM, or yet another flash drive, that you
> physically remove from the machine and place elsewhere in safe storage, far enough away from the
> shack not to be caught in the same fire/burglary/whatever.
>
> If that's all too much effort, at least consider uploading your log regularly to Logbook of the
> World.  LoTW is a 'last resort' backup since it only stores the minimal amount of info on each QSO,
> but at least it is possible to retrieve the basic QSO data if you have no other choice.  This has a
> useful side effect of increasing usage of LoTW!

I don't want to wander off topic here, but John was specific about contesting scenarios and I think we have him covered :)

Also, does LOTW allow for "restoring" your log? I thought they once frowned upon that at one time.

73

Lee
WW2DX

>
> 73
> Gary  ZL2iFB
>
> PS  This applies equally to Macs and PCs.  And PDAs.  Even paper logbooks are both valuable and
> flammable!
>
>
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[Gary Hinson]

> No actually I meant use the flash for the actual live log.
> Flash based drives are far more reliable then traditional platters.

True, probably.

> Flash has a life expectancy for ~10K read/writes far less
> then what would be used in a 24hr contest :)

Is that so?  

> I have had many platter drives fail in my career and as of to
> date never had a flash device fail (knocking on wood).

Me too, Lee, but the key point remains: if you only have a single copy of your log on one device,
you're putting a lot of faith in that one device.  Mechanical reliability of the device is not the
only concern.

> I am also a huge believer in off-site backups as well, we are
> seeing newer technologies like dropbox where it acts more
> like a local drive then a backup device. I use that service
> to create corporate wide shared folders across large
> geographical locations and its been very reliable.

Agreed!
 
> I don't want to wander off topic here, but John was specific
> about contesting scenarios and I think we have him covered :)

Yes but other forumites might have interepreted it in a more general sense.  If between us we help
someone avoid losing their entire log, I think we've done a good deed!

> Also, does LOTW allow for "restoring" your log? I thought
> they once frowned upon that at one time.

I don't know about "them" but yes you can retrieve your whole log, or rather the data they have
retained from the log you submitted to LoTW.  There are hints on how to do this in at least 5
different ways on my website, if anyone needs it: http://www.g4ifb.com/html/lotw.html#UsingLoTW

73 Gary  ZL2iFB

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[Julius Fazekas n2wn]

With 1TB drives in the sub $100 range it's possible to store a tremendous amount of contest info. Think this is excellent advice.

I run N1MM on Win2K and XP machines. The Win2K machine is probably 6 years old. I've never had a HD fail, but have had a PS go out just as a contest started and really should have implemented this advice already. I've had too many problems with Vista to trust it, FWTW.

Don't forget eQSL along with LoTW. LoTW does not officially provide backup logs. You can download sync information for various general logging software, but believe this only has LoTW confirmed QSO information, some details may or may not match what you have logged.

Will have to look into dropbox as a repository option too.

Helpful info all around...

Lee J. Imber (WW2DX) wrote

On Jan 6, 2010, at 10:08 PM, Gary Hinson wrote:

>> One
>> thing I would recommend is to run your log/db on a USB flash
>> based device, this way if your PC decides to  act up or even
>> worse the drive dies then your log will be safe.
>
> Errr, not if the flash drive dies, unless you meant to use the flash as a backup.  With no moving
> parts, flash drives are probably more reliable than conventional hard drives but they are not
> immortal and are only rated for so many read/write operations.  Also *all* your local drives of
> whatever type may go up in flames if the PC or shack catches fire, or someone may steal the lot ....
Hi Gary,

No actually I meant use the flash for the actual live log. Flash based drives are far more reliable then traditional platters.
Flash has a life expectancy for ~10K read/writes far less then what would be used in a 24hr contest :)
I have had many platter drives fail in my career and as of to date never had a flash device fail (knocking on wood).

>
>
>> There are also a few other technologies other then the flash
>> drive approach, you can get a free 2GB account from
>> http://www.dropbox.com and point your log to your dropbox
>> folder and it will backup into the ether in real-time and you
>> can even have the same dropbox folder on a backup PC ready to
>> go.
>
> That's the better option - an offsite backup - if used as a backup, in other words again not the
> only copy.  The online file systems are fine if you have a sufficiently fast and reliable Internet
> connection, but again I would advise sending backups off-site and retaining one or more local copies
> of your log as well, just in case the organization running the offsite system has a technical fault,
> or deletes the files, or whatever (trust me: it happens).

I am also a huge believer in off-site backups as well, we are seeing newer technologies like dropbox where it acts more like a local drive then a backup device. I use that service to create corporate wide shared folders across large geographical locations and its been very reliable.

>
> You can also take occasional offline log backups onto CD-ROM, or yet another flash drive, that you
> physically remove from the machine and place elsewhere in safe storage, far enough away from the
> shack not to be caught in the same fire/burglary/whatever.
>
> If that's all too much effort, at least consider uploading your log regularly to Logbook of the
> World.  LoTW is a 'last resort' backup since it only stores the minimal amount of info on each QSO,
> but at least it is possible to retrieve the basic QSO data if you have no other choice.  This has a
> useful side effect of increasing usage of LoTW!

I don't want to wander off topic here, but John was specific about contesting scenarios and I think we have him covered :)

Also, does LOTW allow for "restoring" your log? I thought they once frowned upon that at one time.

73

Lee
WW2DX

>
> 73
> Gary  ZL2iFB
>
> PS  This applies equally to Macs and PCs.  And PDAs.  Even paper logbooks are both valuable and
> flammable!
>
>
> ______________________________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
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> Post: mailto:[e-mail]
>
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