wrote:
On Sat, 25 Sep 2004 17:34:46 -0500, clifto wrote:
Sometimes DX is DX because it's rare, not necessarily because it's
distant. Don't take the acronym thing too seriously.

So just change the meaning of the acronym to suit your
purposes, right?

I'm not the one who changed it. It's changed over time, the way the
rest of the language changes.

Years ago I was calling CQ until I was blue in the face. Finally, someone
returned; his callsign placed him in Guadeloupe. I ran in the kitchen
and asked dad where that was, and when he told me it was in the
Caribbean I was disappointed; "that's not very far." Still, I had a
nice conversation with the guy for a while. Then we signed... and the
20 meter band became completely unusable, because everybody in creation
wanted to work this (then) rare country. That's when other people
explained to me that a station doesn't have to be distant to be DX.

Again, what do you do after you've heard a station from fully halfway
around the world? I've heard Australia loud and clear, easy catch. I've
worked hundreds of Australian hams. Go ahead and tell me that there is
nothing more to the hobby, since I've heard the very farthest stations.

Failing that, feel free to tell me in a brief sound bite what the
essential desirable achievement of the hobby is.

--
At the end of the new Kerry ad: "I'm John Kerry, and I approved of this
ad before I voted against it."

I'm not the one who changed it. It's changed over time, the way the
rest of the language changes.

true. Just like when I was growing up, "that's a bad shirt you have on"
or "that's so bad" meant the opposite of good.

Now the exact same sentences means the same as really good.

depending on who's saying it and whether they mean 'really good" or mean
"the opposite of "really good" when they say "bad'.

wrote in message
...
On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 02:50:54 -0400, starman wrote:

aristotle wrote:

What is the difference between shortwave dxing and swling.


If you have a beginner class SWL call sign, such as WA4009SWL, you are only
allowed to listen to the major broadcasters with a strong signal on a
portable receiver without a tuning knob (up and down buttons only).

If you get an advanced class DX call sign, such as IQ0001DX, you are allowed
to start chasing those hard to get stations like Radio Huuhaa from Vyborg,
Russia. However, you're limited to a single receiver with a tuning knob and
cannot mix SWL with DX except on government holidays.

If you get a combination masters class call sign, such as IQ1007SWLDX, you
are allowed to SWL and DX simultaneously, one receiver each. However, one of
the receivers has to be a portable without a sync detector.

If you decide to get no call sign whatsoever, you can do anything you want.

Jari S.

Jari Savolainen wrote:

wrote in message
...
On Fri, 24 Sep 2004 02:50:54 -0400, starman wrote:

aristotle wrote:

What is the difference between shortwave dxing and swling.


If you have a beginner class SWL call sign, such as WA4009SWL, you are only
allowed to listen to the major broadcasters with a strong signal on a
portable receiver without a tuning knob (up and down buttons only).

If you get an advanced class DX call sign, such as IQ0001DX, you are allowed
to start chasing those hard to get stations like Radio Huuhaa from Vyborg,
Russia. However, you're limited to a single receiver with a tuning knob and
cannot mix SWL with DX except on government holidays.

If you get a combination masters class call sign, such as IQ1007SWLDX, you
are allowed to SWL and DX simultaneously, one receiver each. However, one of
the receivers has to be a portable without a sync detector.

If you decide to get no call sign whatsoever, you can do anything you want.

Jari S.

I did have one of those callsigns back in the 1960's, it was/is WPE8JSS. That
darn certificate is the only thing I've lost from those beginnining days in
shortwave.

I still have some certificates that Electronics Illustrated offered at the time.

dxAce
Michigan

http://www.iserv.net/~n8kdv/dxpage.htm

"Michael Black" wrote in message
...


But DX can't be an absolute.

Think of VHF, where distant communication is rare or dependent on fancy
techniques. So you normally only hear or talk to local stations. Then
along comes good radio conditions, and you can suddenly hear that station
which isn't particularly far away, but beyond normal reception. Suddenly,
that 300 or whatever mile away station is DX, because it's further than
local.

Or "What's your best DX?". For the beginner, it may not be very far,
because they've not gotten to the distant stations. But since it is
something he's not heard before, it is DX.

Michael


This DX definition question has been a burden to me. Sure, the D in DX must
mean distance. But the more I thought about it, the less sure I became.
Although Australia is about as far away from the US as could be, listening
to 9580 in the morning hardly seems like DXing. Still, you can't get much
more D than that. The question has had it's effect on my sleep. After
several hours of tossing and turning, I opened my eyes to see a short man in
an expensive three piece suit. "You must be David Sarnoff!" I exclaimed.

Sarnoff beamed with joy. "After all these years, I thought only lunatics
would remember me!" He continued talking. "You know, there's a way out of
this DX conundrum. The D is distance. But we don't use a T for
transmissions, we use an X. The term DX isn't perfect."

"I haven't looked it in that way" I replied, "But I don't see your point."

Sarnoff continued, "The term DX is already corrupted. If a letter such as X
can symbolize transmission, why must D mean distance? Can't it mean
difficult? Can't DXing mean listening to difficult to hear signals?"

"Very impressive" I was still just a bit skeptical. "But this might be
more change than radio hobbyists can accept."

Sarnoff flashed a wicked grin. "One day ARRL stood for the Amateur Radio
Relay League. Now, ARRL stands for The National Association for Amateur
Radio!"

I then realized all the stories about Sarnoff were true. "You really are a
genius!!"

"I do have a way with words" said Sarnoff. "I appeared before Larry Magne
and told him that worldband was an even better word for shortwave than
shortwave."

"Man, you're one of the best!" I enthused.

Sarnoff replied coldly "I've been at the top of the game since I was a young
hotshot telegraph operator with American Marconi."

"Hey, Dave!" Sarnoff winced as I called him Dave, "You relayed the first to
last messages during the Titanic sinking and the rescue. 72 hours
straight!"

Sarnoff nodded.

"That's an incredible story!" I found the historical record lacking, and
now I had the chance to fill in the gaps. "Your American Marconi relay
station was in a department store. Your relay station kept the same hours
as the store. The Titanic's first reports came out while the store was
closed. How could you have known about the disaster in time for the first
message? How did you get to the station? Did you have the keys to the
store? That's sure alot of responsibility for a young man!"

Sarnoff stood silent, nervously fingering the grape sized diamond on his
pinky ring.

"And there were so many stations on the air during the emergency that
American Marconi silenced some them to reduce interference. Your station
was one of those shut down. How did you stay on the air? Did you have your
own pirate station?"

He said "Well, there's really not much more to say."

I knew Sarnoff was many things, but he was not modest. Who was this
intruder? Suddenly, my blood ran cold. I instinctively grabbed my bedside
copy of The Radio Engineer's Handbook with one hand and affixed a cross
reference manual to the other.

"IN THE NAME OF FRED TERMAN I ORDER YOU GONE, DEMON!!!"

The Sarnoff Demon was stunned. But no radionic evil can stand up to the
power of the Good Book and an invocation of Terman. The Sarnoff Demon
disappeared in a cloud of selenium rectifier smoke.


I came so close to the fall. I had almost been seduced by the easy way.
I'm going to stick with hard line DX fundamentalism from now on. D means
Distance. Nothing else.

But what distance defines DX? We need a definition which will stand for all
time, past present and future. In the pioneering days of radio, just over
100 years ago, 50 miles was a long haul. I think that's an excellent place
to fix our strict definition of DX.

50 miles.

Frank Dresser

Great story there Frank - thanks for that.
It's true of course - what is a DX catch for a beginner is quite different
from what a veteran DXer might consider DX.
Actually, getting a 11,500 mile catch on HF SW is no big deal for a veteran
DXer, but getting those distances on MW or LW is another thing.

The furthest DX catches I have seen on logged MW are about 10,000 miles, but
that is real DX, the sort of thing that comes in once in a blue moon from a
serious DX location with some hefty beverage antenna's. That sort of thing
only gets logged from the ultimate DX sites by veteran DXer's.

The longest/furthest catch I ever saw logged was by the New Zealanders who
logged one of the high powered LW stations in France, some 11,800 miles from
the DX site near Invercargill.

It's a great hobby = enjoy!
--
John Plimmer, Montagu, Western Cape Province, South Africa
South 33 d 47 m 540 s, East 20 d 07 m 541 s.
RX Drake R8B, SW8
BW XCR 30, Braun T1000, Sangean 818 & 803A.
Hallicrafters SX-100, Eddystone 940
GE circa 50's radiogram
Antenna's RF Systems DX 1 Pro, Datong AD-270
Kiwa MW Loop

"Frank Dresser" wrote in message
...

"Michael Black" wrote in message
...


But DX can't be an absolute.

Think of VHF, where distant communication is rare or dependent on fancy
techniques. So you normally only hear or talk to local stations. Then
along comes good radio conditions, and you can suddenly hear that
station
which isn't particularly far away, but beyond normal reception.
Suddenly,
that 300 or whatever mile away station is DX, because it's further than
local.

Or "What's your best DX?". For the beginner, it may not be very far,
because they've not gotten to the distant stations. But since it is
something he's not heard before, it is DX.

Michael


This DX definition question has been a burden to me. Sure, the D in DX
must
mean distance. But the more I thought about it, the less sure I became.
Although Australia is about as far away from the US as could be, listening
to 9580 in the morning hardly seems like DXing. Still, you can't get much
more D than that. The question has had it's effect on my sleep. After
several hours of tossing and turning, I opened my eyes to see a short man
in
an expensive three piece suit. "You must be David Sarnoff!" I exclaimed.

Sarnoff beamed with joy. "After all these years, I thought only lunatics
would remember me!" He continued talking. "You know, there's a way out
of
this DX conundrum. The D is distance. But we don't use a T for
transmissions, we use an X. The term DX isn't perfect."

"I haven't looked it in that way" I replied, "But I don't see your point."

Sarnoff continued, "The term DX is already corrupted. If a letter such as
X
can symbolize transmission, why must D mean distance? Can't it mean
difficult? Can't DXing mean listening to difficult to hear signals?"

"Very impressive" I was still just a bit skeptical. "But this might be
more change than radio hobbyists can accept."

Sarnoff flashed a wicked grin. "One day ARRL stood for the Amateur Radio
Relay League. Now, ARRL stands for The National Association for Amateur
Radio!"

I then realized all the stories about Sarnoff were true. "You really are
a
genius!!"

"I do have a way with words" said Sarnoff. "I appeared before Larry
Magne
and told him that worldband was an even better word for shortwave than
shortwave."

"Man, you're one of the best!" I enthused.

Sarnoff replied coldly "I've been at the top of the game since I was a
young
hotshot telegraph operator with American Marconi."

"Hey, Dave!" Sarnoff winced as I called him Dave, "You relayed the first
to
last messages during the Titanic sinking and the rescue. 72 hours
straight!"

Sarnoff nodded.

"That's an incredible story!" I found the historical record lacking, and
now I had the chance to fill in the gaps. "Your American Marconi relay
station was in a department store. Your relay station kept the same hours
as the store. The Titanic's first reports came out while the store was
closed. How could you have known about the disaster in time for the first
message? How did you get to the station? Did you have the keys to the
store? That's sure alot of responsibility for a young man!"

Sarnoff stood silent, nervously fingering the grape sized diamond on his
pinky ring.

"And there were so many stations on the air during the emergency that
American Marconi silenced some them to reduce interference. Your station
was one of those shut down. How did you stay on the air? Did you have
your
own pirate station?"

He said "Well, there's really not much more to say."

I knew Sarnoff was many things, but he was not modest. Who was this
intruder? Suddenly, my blood ran cold. I instinctively grabbed my
bedside
copy of The Radio Engineer's Handbook with one hand and affixed a cross
reference manual to the other.

"IN THE NAME OF FRED TERMAN I ORDER YOU GONE, DEMON!!!"

The Sarnoff Demon was stunned. But no radionic evil can stand up to the
power of the Good Book and an invocation of Terman. The Sarnoff Demon
disappeared in a cloud of selenium rectifier smoke.


I came so close to the fall. I had almost been seduced by the easy way.
I'm going to stick with hard line DX fundamentalism from now on. D means
Distance. Nothing else.

But what distance defines DX? We need a definition which will stand for
all
time, past present and future. In the pioneering days of radio, just over
100 years ago, 50 miles was a long haul. I think that's an excellent
place
to fix our strict definition of DX.

50 miles.

Frank Dresser