Overcoming RF in the shack, the sneaky way
Life has conspired to keep me from doing as much with ham radio lately, but I'm happy to report that I'm at least back on the air. In my last post I described my troubles with RF getting into the shack which resets my radio-computer CI-V (CAT) control. I posited that finally setting up a first-class station ground would help, but alas, I haven't gotten that far. However, I did find a sneaky solution to my problem. The radio was connected to my desktop computer with USB extension cords which made the entire USB run about 10 ft. I made those runs shorter, not by moving anything particular, but by adding a Raspberry Pi single-board computer dedicated to running the radio. This keeps the USB cords a couple of feet long, and so far it has resolved the interference that was resetting my CAT control. I can run VNC remote desktop from my main computer for a similar experience to what I was doing before, but I also now have the option to use a laptop around the house, which is kind ...