True, though you can probably hear the splatter from an even frequency station if you’re on the adjacent odd frequency and then tune up/down 100 kHz using the arrow keys.
Assuming of course that the DX on the even channels is strong enough to cause splatter! Stuff like 88.2 Fiji and 90.0 Vanuatu need to be tuned directly.
Like success in any field, DXing (especially for Es) requires some hard work. Even if you use an SDR and capture the band automatically, you’ve got many, many hours of sifting through the recordings ahead of you!
Getting fleeting 2Es/3Es reception on FM requires much dedication. That’s why I only seriously DX for Es over the holiday season.
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Just an update on the Sydney TEF servers:
- South and vertical (omni): These have been joined into a single headless TEF server just called South, but both the South and Vertical antennas are accessible.
- East: There shouldn’t be any visible changes, but this is now running off a headless TEF also
Why the changes?
- Having both South and Omni on the same server allows for quick swapping of antennas to check if a station being received is a local station or if it’s been overriden with a tropo station (e.g. 107.1 Highlands FM vs ABC Local Western Plains), or which tropo station it is (e.g. 97.1 on NW is more likely to be 2MG but is more likely to be ABC RN Taree on the NE antenna)
- The non-headless TEFs had a tendency of dropping RDS after a while, or even the entire connection – the headless ones generally have a more reliable connection
- Not needing to deal with USB sound dongles
- Better RDS decoding (and possibly sensitivity? Not sure about this one)
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In addition to the RDS monitoring dashboard I mentioned over on the RDS thread, I’ve also set up a user monitoring plugin and dashboard to help identify abuse of the FM-DX-Webservers. Some screenshots:
Dashboard to see how long each user has connected for (cumulative over the duration of the logs), their location + ISP:
Map of user locations:
Individual sessions, sorted by most recent, aggregated across all five servers:
You can also give a descriptive name to a particular IP address to monitor any problematic users more easily:
It’s in its early stages at the moment, but if there’s interest in it from other TEF server operators, I could make the plugin (to log the data) and dashboard (to summarise the data) availble to the other operators in the future. Likewise with the RDS dashboard.
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I’m keen to give this a go along with the RDS dashboard
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I’ll get in touch with you via PM when I have the time to package things up :).
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Add me to the gimmie gimmie list as well thanks No Rush
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The last peice of the FM transition puzzlw is in place with the switchover in TX location for 101.7. with a noticable 12dBf increase in Power levels from previous at my location.
With this done we can/may expect some test trasmisions of at least Perth Local on 102.5
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Time to generate a new logo
Several AUS/NZ TEF webservers not functional or offline at the moment.
AUS (Qld): Bribie Is & Brisbane not functional. Gold Coast (came & went in the blink of an eye). Sub Total 3
NZ: Fenners (Auckland) - gone. And the other Auckland webserver not functional. Sub Total: 2
Total: 5
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The node operators provide their services for free so 100% uptime should not be expected. There may be issues with internet connectivity, abuse, storms etc. which can take nodes offline at short notice. Storms (very frequent and often severe) are one reason why I don’t operate a node down here.
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It‘s more of an observation than anything, except a couple of them probably just require a simple reset & all the above have had problems/disappearances for a significant period of time. The Brisbane webserver we know requires an investiture of time to remedy. 
As for the other two that have gone AWOL: 
Can anyone here provide information of what plugin or option setting is needs to be set to enable multi Bank selection of button presets at the bottom of the webserver page. I thought it was in the plugin buttonpresets but this seems not to be the case.
Rather than have multiple lines of presets I want to get it back to Bamk A/B/C so I can allocate a bank to specific directions or locations station’s for FM DX monitoring.
I lost this function many webserver versions ago. I see a couple of online servers still have this feature
It was indeed Button Presets that had that option. Not sure how to get it back. There’s a whole bunch of settings in pluginButtonPresets.js - maybe one of them will bring back the banks switch.
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Thanks that is what I thought as well. I am experimenting with the file seeing what changes. I’ve asked for a copy from another server owner who has the bank function working for a copy of their button preset file and I will replace it just to see what is different
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my fix was very basic and crude. I replaced the pluginButtonPresets from V 1.3.5 with pluginButtonPresets from v 1.2.9. this returned the Bank A/B/C selection option. It also cleanup the layout of the logos along the bottom to a uniform layout.
A quick compariion of the pluginButtonPresets.js files and you can see several suttle entries and variations on the older version that were not included in 1.3.5 it works fine for me and is fit for purpose I may contact the developer some day and see if they can reinstate the Bank selection but it is working now so am happy
Thanks Ryan for your help, the moral of the story is don’t update this plugin if you use this option.
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Eagle Farm Rx is on a more stable connection now.
Enjoy.
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New permanent webserver in Buxton, Victoria, Australia setup. With 2x 4 element Yagis mounted at 7m AGL Still have some issues to iron out (with the internet and wiring) so might be on and off for a few weeks but at least the main setup is done!
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Interesting to see what can be heard from there as opposed to down in the big smoke. You won’t get the coastal ducts from near Alexandra, but you’ll be better placed for inland openings to the north. You may even hear the likes of Coonabarabran and Narrabri from there.
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After all this time I’ve only just realised there’s a spectrum graph option for the TEF nodes, accessible by clicking on the node name at top left (spectrum is the fourth menu option). This allows you to see what frequencies are open as well as tune directly by clicking on the graph. It’s a much quicker and easier way to operate the nodes, particularly when you know what’s local and what’s DX in an area.
I also note that only the @tvcl north beam is online at the moment. I am not sure if this is a deliberate decision or not, since it’s outside of DX season.
I can’t see the Buxton server either, not sure if you’re still testing it and whether it’s only online at certain times.
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