Want to bone up on wireless tech? Try ham radio

veritas_libertas

Want to bone up on wireless tech? Try ham radio

UnixGeek

Interesting article. Ham radio's been a welcome diversion from certification related studies for the past couple months. I started out with the intention of just getting my Technician license, and got hooked. Studying for these exams has strengthened my understandings of both electronics and wireless communications.

There are 4 primary domains that the exams cover:

1. Electronics

This starts simple with Ohm's law and the like on the Technician exam, and progresses to diagnosing circuit diagrams, and picking the right types of components given a set of requirements by the time you get to the Extra.

2. Wireless communications

This is tightly coupled with the electronics theory, and is the type of stuff that you'd see in a College Physics 101 course, combined with what an Introduction to Telecommunications course might cover when discussing modulation techniques.

3. Networking

The networking material won't be anything conceptually new to anyone who's been working with data networks for a while, and has a CCNA level of knowledge or better, but it is interesting to see how technologies that were developed for wireless networks are used by hams, even after being considered obsolete in the wired world. A variant of X.25, for example, still has a strong presence on the ham bands, as do bulletin boards.

4. Regulations

Both the easiest, and most dry section. A lot of this is tied back into the Electronics section though, for example, calculating peak output power, and effective isotropic radiated power to determine if you're within the legal limits.

The exams get progressively more difficult, as do the thicknesses of the ARRL books that I read for them. I've passed the Technician and General, and am taking the Extra next Saturday.

Who else on the board is a ham?

PC509

Right here. Technician class. KE7UOP. Up here in the Portland, OR area. I'm only on the 2M, with a homemade antenna and a WAY old ICOM radio (crystals need to be replaced to change frequency!). I plan on getting a newer radio, but this one is really teaching me a lot.

I plan on going to the Extra class eventually. It does teach you a lot about wireless technologies, from the original wireless communication format!