Tag: beginner

  • Choosing a Laptop for Field Operating

    Part of our Where to Spend Your Money guide. A laptop that works fine on your shack desk can be genuinely frustrating in the field, where sunlight, dust, and limited power access expose weaknesses a desk setup never reveals. Battery Life Matters More Than Raw Power For digital modes, logging, or CAT control in the…

  • Getting Started with Cheap SDR Receivers: RTL-SDR and HackRF

    What a $30 RTL-SDR dongle can actually do, how HackRF extends that, and how to get either one running.

  • Why Ham Radio Matters: A Hobby, a Lifeline, and a Century of Proof

    Why ham radio still matters: the hobby, what it does for you, your family, and your town, and a century of times it kept people alive when everything else failed.

  • How to Use AI to Program Your Ham Radio (With a Free CHIRP File)

    I gave an AI assistant one plain-English prompt and got back a CHIRP-ready CSV with my local repeaters, calling frequencies, weather channels, and more. Here is the prompt, the file, and what you have to verify.

  • Installing a Ham Dual-Band Mobile Radio in Your Vehicle

    Part of our Building Your First Ham Radio Station guide. Installing a dual-band mobile follows the same basic principles as any mobile radio install, and getting the fundamentals right the first time saves you from chasing mystery problems down the road. Power: Straight to the Battery Run power leads directly to the battery rather than…

  • Field Day vs POTA vs SOTA: What’s the Difference and Which to Try First

    Part of our Getting On The Air guide. These three activities all get lumped together as portable operating, but they have genuinely different formats, goals, and time commitments, and knowing the differences helps you pick the right starting point. ARRL Field Day: One Big Annual Event Field Day happens once a year, the fourth full…

  • Tools Every New Ham Should Own for Basic Station Work

    Part of our Building Your First Ham Radio Station guide. You do not need a full electronics bench to get started in this hobby, but a handful of basic tools will save you real frustration on your first antenna build or connector job. The Essentials A good wire stripper sized for the gauges you actually…

  • Choosing Your First HT: A Buyer’s Framework Beyond “Just Get a Baofeng”

    Part of our Handheld Radios (HTs) guide. “Just get a Baofeng” is common advice for a new ham’s first HT, and it is not wrong exactly, but it skips over a decision that deserves a bit more thought than grabbing the cheapest radio on the shelf. What a Budget Radio Actually Gets You Radios like…

  • What Happens When You Key Up: A Beginner’s Walkthrough of the Transmit Chain

    Pressing PTT feels instant. Here is everything your radio actually does in that split second.

  • 3D Printing for Ham Radio: Antenna Mounts, Cases, and Field Accessories

    A $200 printer solves a surprising number of small ham radio annoyances that nobody sells a product for.

  • VE Session Day-Of: What Actually Happens During Your Exam

    Part of our Getting Licensed guide. I run VE sessions regularly, and the single biggest source of test-day anxiety I see is not the material itself. It is not knowing what the actual process looks like. So let me walk through exactly what happens from the moment you show up to the moment you have…

  • Mentoring a New Ham: How to Be a Good Elmer

    Part of our Clubs and Nets guide. Elmer is one of those ham radio traditions that everyone talks about fondly and almost nobody explains well. It just means a mentor, someone experienced who takes a new ham under their wing and helps them actually get on the air instead of just passing a test and…

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