Packet Radio, and Viewdata for the 21st century!

A ‘tongue in cheek’ look at combining amateur Packet Radio with viewdata/videotex to provide a tactical digital radio network for the 21st century.
In previous videos I showed how you could connect a 1980s computer to viewdata and bulletin board systems using a modem and the telephone network. During the mid 80s, before the web was invented, this was the primary way to get your ‘on-line fix’. However, if you were a Radio Amateur back in the day you would have most likely used a Packet Radio system to go online instead.
So here is a video that demonstrated this…. but there’s more!
Packet Radio Details
The Node is TSTAR:G6AML-7 and is located in Upper Basildon, Berkshire IO91KL. It uses a Yaesu FT2600M with TinyTrak 4 TNC and LinBPQ running on a Raspberry Pi. The antenna is a Diamond X30.
For the BBC Micro, the Commstar communications ROM was used connected to a PK88 TNC and Yaesu FT2600M. The antenna was an unbranded Diamond X30 clone. The communications settings were 1200 7E1.
The Linus Laptop (intel MacBook Pro) Used the Telstar Viewdata Client connected to the Kenwood TH-D72. The communications settings were 9600 8N1 (Packet Radio communications were at 1200 baud).
Links
groups.io/g/HantsBerksPacket/...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packet_...
www.bugoutbagbuilder.com/blog...
BBC Micro Setup
The baud rate and parity settings are determined by the TNC computer interface settings. In the case of PK88 with a BBC Micro running Commstar, I used 1200/1200 baud 7E1. This was the case for both Terminal and Prestel modes.
Telstar
Details of Telstar Viewdata Service including the viewdata client software for Windows/MacOS/Linux at glasstty.com/telstar
BPQ Configuration to support Telstar.
Add the following line to the Applications section of bpq32.cfg.
APPLICATION 2,TELSTAR,ATTACH 10 GLASSTTY.COM 6503,G6AML-5,TSTARV,0

[@commnavrizzo]

I'm not sure that I would call this pointless. I believe at some point packet radio BBS will be essential. Although I figure the state of the world will not be good if that is the case. I appreciate you sharing!

[@zxspectum]

Great video, love the log cabin. As a child growing up in the 80's, the ever present threat nuclear war on TV and everywhere has been etched the mindset of survival in us all I think.

[@glenwoofit]

1200 BPS was fun but 9K6 was like lightning ⚡⚡⚡

[@chairulhalim4447]

Great video for old packet radio. I love to see these old stuffs are still working perfect such as old computers and monitors, mechanical keyboard, modems, TNC as well as TTY terminal. I missed it a lot. 👍👍👍

[@lordmelbury7174]

Life is pointless, so we may as well just bask in all things pointless for some escapism!

[@abbyck]

Just discovered this gem. Top notch explanation 👌

[@Dayta]

i just thought back about that time we climbed around on that places where they leave cars after their life time dont know the exact name for that .. and searching for taxis trying to find some old radio in them to connect them to our amigas and have a connection that was like SEVERAL hundret meters :D so we could write stuff and play games like .. walk one ascii coord to the north and stuff like that .. i dont recall the names of those games but nostalgy kicking in watching this video :) so thanks for the nostalgic feeling

[@G7LWT]

Wonderful - thanks John!!!

[@Butangeld]

Many thanks! My dad used packet radio back in the 80s, with a Spectrum. I never really got the significance of it at the time, but I remember him downloading programs for other radio comms, like morse code and other HAM related stuff!

[@TalmidAndy]

Packet is definitely making a comeback and this is a brilliant idea. I had tried TeeFax with amateur TV but few American TVs are capable of any kind of videotext.

[@ianhand5006]

Trio TR2300! I always wanted one, back in the early 80’s. I bought a Yaesu FT-207R for next to nothing, I still have it and it still works.

[@bart.grantham]

"I hope you agree that it's been, as usual, a fairly pointless exercise..."

[@vbrindle]

Love this.

[@joeyscarlett7994]

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. You have really created something special. Truly a beautiful work of art. Just got my amateur tech in 2022 and I have been searching for something like this. Can't wait to set up my own page/ frame. I don't understand why packet is such an obscure aspect of amateur radio. I absolutely love it.

[@TimonSuricata]

I miss the BBS Dialup days, that felt very special to, now i need to get into packet radio bbs this stuff is awesome, something i have not gotten into yet, but looking forward to it!

[@PrebleStreetRecords]

Fantastic video! Here in the US packet is seeing a resurgence, thanks to off-the-shelf interfaces like the DigiRig.

[@RTSRetroTechShed]

Thanks for another very informative video. Viewdata over packet radio = Excellent idea!. I still use AX.25 packet radio (Amateur / HAM Radio) to access my local BBS node on occasion, but no longer have a dedicated TNC (sold my Kantronics years ago). I now mainly use the TNC built into a Kenwood TM-D710G or software TNC using Direwolf. BBS access at 1200 is ok, but not so great for TCP/IP (AMPRnet) :)

[@williamhowell1791]

To this date, and for the last 20 or so years, I've never understood why the Amateur world has not moved on from 1200 baud to at least at a minimum 9600 baud rates. With the current technologies available today why in the heck are we still stuck at 1200 baud rate over the radio... It's no wonder packet radio communications went into the trash and until something comes along that faster than 1200 or even 9600 baud rates it will pretty well stay in the trash... You did great on this video, always good for the young people coming along to know about what and how we communicated over 30 years ago.

[@daveschwarz5279]

In a war in the middle of nowhere in your Wendy house survival coms …genius 😂❤

[@247SH]

I used to do packet radio in the 80s and would like to have another go. Thanks for the info.