Hi again Ron.

I forgot to mention the small detail of cost.  If you go the radio route,
you'll obviously need a transceiver to do this.  I use the Kenwood TM-V71A
dual band transceiver, and it costs around $300 or so.  You can wire your
own cables, or do as I did and buy them from Kenwood.  I don't know if
there's a cable to go from the Kenwood to USB, but the radio uses RS-232, so
there's some sort of converter that's needed, whether built into the cable
or not.  You'll also need, obviously, a PC to control the radio and run
EchoLink.  One nice thing about the Kenwood radio I use is it has
programming software for it.  I use JAWS on that PC, and it's very speech
friendly with JAWS 14, plus the software is free, the same cost as the
EchoLink software.  As for internet, as I said you'll need a broadband
connection.  I don't know how easy that would be to get to your repeater,
but a possible solution is to use a wireless hot spot.  This device uses the
cell network to connect your PC to the internet, and you can either go with
one that hooks up via USB or, like mine, one that uses WI-FI to link the PC
to the mobile hot spot.  I have one from T Mobile, and I get 4 gigs of
download speed for $30 per month.  If you're planning on EchoLink to be the
only thing on this connection, it may be a decent option as long as EchoLink
either doesn't use a lot of multiple connections, or it isn't used for
extended periods of time per month.

As I said above, the mobile hot spot is good for an area where you don't
have easy access to broadband internet that's wired.  If you do have access
to this, I'd recommend it over the mobile hot spot.  You get more bandwidth,
and it's faster than the mobile hot spot.  It is more expensive, at least
mine is, but I prefer it to my mobile hot spot as my main internet
connection, not only for bandwidth, but I also do other things with my
internet, such as send and receive emails like yours, plus I listen to
streams with Winamp, do an internet broadcast every Saturday night, (if you
like music of all genres from the late 1920's through today, tune into

http://acbradio.org

from 9 p.m. to Midnight).  Cheap plug, I know.  I also stream video sports
using my Apple TV, so if I used my mobile hot spot for this I'd quickly
reach my band limit, and I could either be throttled back or increase my
amount of data.  They have up to 12 gigs max for $70 per month, so I may do
that eventually to have a backup for internet.

Both ways of accessing the internet do work, and it's up to you to decide
which works for you.  One nice thing about using a wired internet is you can
use it in your home, and Echolink uses minimal bandwidth.  It's how I have
EchoLink set up, and it is negligible as to the cost on my electric bill.
It doesn't cost me anything extra for internet, because I'd have this
internet connection anyway.  Also, running off sight with EchoLink doesn't
require a fancy antenna to reach the repeater.  I have my EchoLink radio
running 5 watts to a mag mount antenna in the bedroom of my apartment, and I
haven't had anybody report that it doesn't receive or transmit adequately.
If you decide to do the internet on site, if you have a phone line for
things like autopatch, there's a good chance you could get DSL.  I don't
know if your site has cable or not, so that may figure into what you want to
do.

That's all I can think of.  I apologize if this note seems to ramble a bit,
but I was writing things down as I thought of them.  If you need something
clarified, or have any other questions, let me know.

73
Kevin Minor, Lexington, KY
[log in to unmask]