I love it when readers ask me questions. They get me to do some research and provide a lot of material for this blog. Not only that, they help me find products and resources that make amateur radio more fun.
A couple of days ago, Pat, W5WTH wrote:
I really enjoy the blog and your Tech and General books helped me a great deal. I also really enjoy the podcast (great audio quality on that, btw), THX!!
In a previous post, you wrote about the lack of IC-7300 support in Chirp. Did you ever find a Chirp (or Chirp like) solution for managing the IC7300 memories?
I never did much more research into this, but Pat’s email prompted me to do a little Googling this morning. I did a search for “ic7300 memory manager” and came up with a few hits:
- WCS-7300 Radio Programming Software from RT Systems (https://www.rtsystemsinc.com/Articles.asp?ID=582). This looks like a nice package—as are all the RT Systems software packages—but costs $35.
- Win4IcomSuite (https://icom.va2fsq.com/). This program costs $50, but is a more comprehensive package than WCS-7300. Think of it as HamRadioDeluxe for Icoms. An intriguing feature is that it says it “supports the built-in ICOM spectrum scopes.” I didn’t think that this was possible with the IC-7300, but I could be wrong (see image above). If so, this would be a cool feature. I’ve emailed VA2FSQ to get a clarification.
- VK4ADC Icom Memories Manager (https://www.vk4adc.com/web/software-projects/55-vk4adc-utils/49-icommems). Unfortunately, while this shows up in a Google search, the website seems to be down.
- G3NRW IC-7300 Resources Page (http://g3nrw.net/IC-7300/?page_id=323). This page lists a lot of software, including the WCS-7300 and Win4IcomSuite, that can either be used to control the IC-7300 or can be used to do digital modes with the IC-7300.
I don’t think that my laptop has enough computing power to really do Win4IcomSuite justice, but I have a new tower computer on the way. If Win4IcomSuite can really do all that it says it can do, I think I’m going to pop for it when my new computer shows up and I get it all set up.
Wonder if the IC-7300 spectrum display on Win4IcomSuite is real time. P3Utililty will download a spectrum grab from my Elecraft K3/P3, but it is freeze-frame. The P3 uses a serial interface, and that is likely the basic limitation.
If it is real-time, it would be interesting to see how they manage the bandwidth requirements. It may not be too hard, if you consider that only the current sample is really needed, if the PC builds its own waterfall display from previous samples.
Using USB as the interface certainly helps, over the usual serial ports in use on other radios.
On the other hand, I recall that I specifically sought out a laptop (a Sony Vaio) that had fire-wire interface that I could use with the sound interface I used with my Larry Phipps N8LP, LP-PAN panadapter, to cut down on the CPU load, instead of using USB. Early Flex radios used Ethernet for the same reason, when the PC CPU had to do most of the heavy lifting. More recent Flex Radios have most of the heavy lifting now in their boxes, so the PC is more of a lightweight client for them.
I understand that the IC-7300 is a direct-sampling SDR radio, so it’s likely more similar to a Flex Radio in that regard, except the dials/switches are built-in, which makes it pretty unique in that regard.
Win4IcomSuite will let you enter some memory info but won’t let you move channels around. Once one is in there, you have to delete it or write over top of it. You can’t insert.
Have you found any other alternatives yet?
To be honest, I wasn’t very proactive about looking for memory managers, and now I’ve started using a Flex 6400.
https://vk4adc.com/web/index.php/software-projects/55-vk4adc-utils/49-icommems appears to be the new link… evidently he changed his website around.
KB3HHA Memory Manager is exactly what you wished for, and it’s free!
https://kb3hha.com/LiteEdition