[Jeffhs]

I got my first amateur license in 1972. First rig was a Heathkit DX-40 transmitter, Hallicrafters SX101A Mark III receiver with WWV (I liked seeing all seven tuning scales light up when the receiver's band switch was on the WWV position), and a 25-foot loaded vertical antenna permanently set for 40 meters. When the Novice ticket expired, I upgraded to Technician Plus and got back on HF with the DX40 and SX101A, but by this time I had moved back to my hometown -- which meant a new antenna. I put up a trap vertical for 80 through ten meters, and fed it with the DX40 in the beginning, then with a Tempo "ONE" 240-watt all-band transceiver, then with a Kenwood TS-530, and finally, with an Icom 9-band 100-watt rig I had won at a hamfest. I used these three rigs to work 49 states and a handful of foreign countries with, by now, a 70-foot dipole in my back yard. Skipping the details, I had to give all this up in August 1999 when the antenna came down and I found out, shortly thereafter, I would have to move. This meant, once I was settled in the apartment in which I live today, I had to give up high-power hamming, which left me with only 2 meters using a handheld with a local repeater. Much later, I discovered EchoLink, which was developed by a New England amateur (Jonathan Taylor, K1RFD) in the '90s and enables licensed hams to communicate in real time with each other over the Internet; no antennas required by user stations, although it is a bit more complicated if you want to operate your own repeater or link station using the software and a hardware interface unit. I installed the software on my computer, validated my callsign, and was on the air, in a manner of speaking, in minutes after that.

The program is still on my computer (I had upgraded from Win98 to XP a year or so earlier, so had to reinstall the software) but I haven't used it much except for testing via the EL test server. I don't know why I don't use the setup as much as I know I could nowadays; with no worries about TVI/RFI or overloading power lines with a high-power linear amplifier, to say nothing of freedom from worrying about losing antennas in wind or snow storms (I had my share of such problems with the all-band dipole at my former home), I can now get on the air any time. With some 4,500 stations on the air on EL at any given time, there is no shortage of people I can talk to. Granted, EL is not set up for CW (I worked mostly 30-meter CW from my former home in a Cleveland suburb), but I am happy to be back on the air regardless.

One program I would not recommend, however, is CQ-100, a program developed by a Canadian amateur (VE3EFD) and modeled, somewhat, after K1RFD's Echolink. This program allows communication between licensed hams over the Internet somewhat similar to EL, but that is where the similarity ends. CQ-100 is a QSO "simulator", little more than a glorified chat room, access to which is granted only to licensed amateurs (the callsign validation procedure, however, is almost identical to that for EchoLink).

Even though the transceiver-like interface for CQ-100 has a clickable button marked "CW", however, I do not think the software actually supports CW or any other emission mode but voice. If it does support code transmission, it is likely that the sending process is via the computer keyboard, not a straight key or keyer paddle.

Again, I do not recommend CQ-100 if you're looking for an antenna-less way to get back into HF ham radio, as this is definitely not amateur radio as we know it; it is literally a glorified chat room -- and, although the CQ100 software is freeware, there is a charge of over $30 annually for access to the system's servers. EchoLink, on the other hand, is 100 percent free and allows communications with real amateur stations at any time. If you want to get back into ham radio without worrying about antennas (or if, like myself, you cannot erect outdoor ones), K1RFD's EchoLink is the way to go.