An Answering Machine For Your Ham Radio? - Beta Testing The Boondock Echo
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- čas přidán 11. 09. 2024
- Boondock asked me to beta test their new Echo device, and didn't even ask me to do a video... so I did one anyway!
The Boondock Echo is essentially a radio answering machine. This gadget uses an ESP32 system to record audio from a two-way radio and act as a time-shift message center. It has a cloud service with speec-to-text and keyword notifications. It can transmit and receive, functioning as a repeater in addition to a recorder. The system has a few features that are still in development, and it still a bit of a prototype, but it's kind of a cool product!
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This thing looks really cool. Another of those things you see and ask "Why didn't anyone else make one sooner?"
But then I don't know jack squat about ham radio so maybe there isn't much call for it.
2:57 “It’s my fault it’s wrinkled, I sat on it and then my cat sat on it.” 😂 in the most casual voice! This is why enjoy watching your videos!
I had this idea years ago. I looked and HT to a micro cassette recorder set on vox. It recorded all the repeater communication for me during the day. I could go back and listen to it later. It was a bit slow on initial recording and missed a few words at the beginning of each conversation but it worked great otherwise. This is much fancier. I hope this company succeeds.
Great minds think alike and all that! We've got the audio going into a circular buffer in ram. I want to say around 500 ms (but I'm not sure the actual value, so don't quote me on that). So that when audio is detected, we can start writing the buffer to the SD card and never miss any audio. Thanks for the well wishes!
Thanks!
When I think boondocking, the first thing that comes to mind is cloud connectivity!
We are working on enhancing the off-grid options.
Love the channel, but I find it wildly amusing that you refer to that connector as a "Bao-feng connector" that "might work with a Kenwood radio." Heh. That style of connector is actually a Kenwood Connector that has been adopted by bazillions of other radio manufacturers over the years. Bao-feng just happens to be (one of) the latest and greatest trendy new brands that use that connector. Trust me, I was using that connector on my Kenwood TK-270 radio in the fire service back in the 1990's long before anybody (in North America anyway) had ever heard of Bao-feng.
Old murs radio are still super popular for security departments in large buildings like hospitals
I knew a guy who did this in the 90's with an Amiga.
@@Xact-ToeBladesAnd subscription only.
My Uncle worked for Concordia UN in Morehead. Our family had a farm in Page, ND.
This is neat, could be useful for a few things. One thing I would hope they do is with those ESP32 boards is having it host the web gui local. A small battery or GPS module to fix the RTC issue. Thats my humble opinion on it but I really do see this to be a pretty neat device.
Thanks @RobertBurgessAKADex ! We like it too :) We do have a version of the board with a RTC on it. But that version has microcontrollers that are marked with one product ID that are not like the others. So we had to revert to the prototype to keep software development rolling. The end goal is to move all online features locally. But that will require a more powerful micro.
Thanks! both great options for fixing time. The device also has Li-ion battery controller. Another option would be to add Li-ion batteries on it & put it on deep sleep.
A very nice and versatile device, thank you for introducing us to the device.
Exciting project can imagine a myriad of uses for it !
Thanks!
what a neat little device. it seems super useful.
@@Xact-ToeBlades i’m sorry i’m not a bot. i’m just autistic 😭
Glad you liked it @rey273
@@Xact-ToeBlades You do realize, that if all these accounts are really bots, that you engaging with each and every one of them is going to look as incredibly high engagement and promote them to the algorithm? Or maybe even make youtube think you're the bot?😆
I PROMISE IM NOT A BOT I'M JUST AUTISTIC AND NEW TO THE TINKERING COMMUNITY I'M TRYING TO BE POLITE AND SHIT @@ke6wob920
@@rey273 You've done nothing wrong. You're just fine. Xact-ToeJam over there was trolling everybody. He's all throughout the thread. He was accusing anyone who had anything nice to say a bot. You just got caught in his hateful crossfire. You're doing just fine!
A working off line mode would be a must! Just listen for callsign maybe one or two other words & auto record.
Using with the cloud could be a bonus if thats what you want.
Look up the definition of boondocking. Cool device thanks for posting ! Boofwangs rule .
"working offline mode would be a must" Agreed -- it was an issue with that one version of firmware that has since been fixed. However, this version of hardware isn't powerful enough to do word detection on device (it's a microcontroller). The next version will allow far more offline capability.
@@boondocktechnologies I haven't personally played with the esp32, but I was under the impression that it would be powerful enough to at least listen for one word, the call sign. So if it's not powerful enough what about a FPGA? Too expensive?
@@petevenuti7355 Just an FYI -- we do have plans to have some level of offline keyword recognition & transcription on future versions. But the device we're using now, the ESP32-A1S, we've squeezed just about every little bit of memory and code-space out of the device. Having it detect your call sign, accurately, just isn't going to happen on this box.
But the limitation was imposed by the industry at the time -- we started developing this during the silicon shortage, and we couldn't get a reliable supply of more advanced microprocessors. The market has changed now, and we are already in the early stages of choosing what we'll put in the next version.
This version will be less expensive and less powerful than we like (hence needing the cloud for translation/transcription/etc.). But we definitely want the next version to have more on-device capability.
@@boondocktechnologies Sounds great!
This thing reminds me of the old DTMF interface.
If you had a full duplex system, you could make phone calls from your handheld
I’ve contacted the company to also try this out! Can be very helpful in emergency situations! Great tool to test and have fun!
@Xact-ToeBlades huh? 🤔
Even for messages for repeater operators.
@@markaz2kk you can't pull the wool over Mark's eyes
I want one with casette tapes like the telephones used.
I'm not sure if you're joking or not. But yeah, I think that'd be kinda cool!
This is a pretty neat device and I'm impressed they are able to do so much with an ESP!
You and me both. But we didn't really have a choice. We started this project during the silicone shortage. Nary a Raspberry Pi or other microprocessor in sight.
@@boondocktechnologies I guess one advantage is that the ESP draws less and supports sleeping to extend battery, which might have accidentally (?) put this into a spot to be used as a remote station with a solar panel.
I feel you on the silicon shortage issues... I pretty much stopped my rpi projects and it's just nodemcu esp8266 or esp32 stuff for me recently. Cool and inexpensive platform. The limited resources available are driving me towards more efficient code and setting more realistic feature lists. 😅
@@gannas42 Yeah -- definitely made KC very deliberate about every line of code that he wrote. We do want a future version to have more capability for offline-mode features. But we're pretty happy with this for the first one.
ESP32 is limited. we are squeezing maximum juice out of it. But I am sure we can do more.
@@KD9VFU Very awesome work you have done here. 👏👏👏
Suddenly feeling very self-conscious about my own Baofeng.
Somewhat like the ( now ) older Packet BBS but with better intentions. Our area is having issues with pirates (likely CB truckers) using Ham Radio 146.52. This would be great to remotely listen and capture their conversations. I'd buy one.
@mattstosh6960 absolutely! And then ship it all off to the FCC. Or you can get a KrakenSDR and figure out where the little buggers are!
I’d love the speech to text to be inbuilt so it works off the grid!
[edited because I misunderstood the first time]: Yeah -- us too. We're already planning one that hopefully will have enough processor power to pull it off.
Most anticipated feature :)
@@boondocktechnologiesas someone who worked a lot in speech to text, good luck on this! It's a really hard problem to solve and wish you the best!
@@defrabe1 Yeah -- not an easy problem to solve, to be sure. But right now we're certain we don't have the processing power for it. We hope that with each iteration, we are able to move more and more features onto the device.
Looks like a great project. I will definitely follow up
All it needs to say is"[call sign] 10db-S9 73s CQ DX"
Sounds interesting, it'll depend on what it costs for me. I already stream several SDRs for my own use using reverse proxies and wireguard including local clear P25 talkgroups (icecast) but I believe I could find a use for one of these specifically the TX function. I have dozens of ESP32s and given some time I might be able to replicate this functionality on my own but there's enough interface polish and hardware/software problem solving that given the right price I'd be happy to buy over build.
Hardware and firmware is open source you could bring up your own design or buy the current dev board we are using. The esp we are using has the audio codec on board but you can buy breakout boards for it if wanting to use your esp.
@@ElectronicSupersonic What I meant to imply is that I'd be willing to buy it in lieu of building, mostly because I have too many prospective projects at the moment and I'd probably never get around to it. It's fine by me to sometimes do this so long as the product offers good value.
Enjoyed your hack a day today....
An interesting concept but as both a ham and radio professional I can already see several issues with implementation in a amateur radio or mission critical installation.
We don't want to be anywhere near a mission-critical installation for a long, long time. The tech isn't anywhere near sophisticated enough yet.
Nifty! Thanks for the video.
You are my favorite CZcamsr, you do the same thing I do find basic crap and make it work lol
"Ah, Houston, Flight, we're about to BEEP on the Moon!. Flight, Houston. You do and you're picking it up, Neil...." A joke from the mid-1970s that your "transcribing static" reminded me of...
Neat device and it definitely has some very good use cases, but I'm not sure I'd want my communications uploaded to the cloud unless I was performing disaster recovery activities or working under some sort of emergency circumstances. We're already surveilled too much as it is.
Boondock in the boondocks .... .... Ha !
That is the ultimate goal. Have a fully offline device. But we've got to work to get to the destination. This device is just one of many that will appear along the way.
Nice coverage of this new toy. Even the inside. A pretty interesting device. Radio Shack sold a device they called a simplex repeater, and that's exactly what it did. It repeated what you said right after you let go of the mike. Drove people nuts. Almost no practical use for the device at all. However this boondock box has potential. One piece of criticism. There is no part of the amateur radio spectrum that is channelized. So remove the word channel from your ham radio vocabulary. Save it for CB and FRS.
Poor guys at Kenwood 😅 , i was wondering of he will call it a Baofeng or Kenwood connector
Neat gadget. For the right price it would be worth it to replace my laptop-based recording setup.
That would be cool to setup with some SDRs to keep track of whats happening between Venezuela and Guyana..
What is happening between Venezuela and Guyana? Now I have to know!
@@boondocktechnologiesVenezuelas dictator has decided that invading Guyana will make the Venezuelaians forget that their economy has ceased to exist.
@@KR-hg8be Well that's freaking horrible. But thanks for replying.
love it, thanks😁😁
Pretty neat, but I can't help, but think this makes more sense as a piece of software rather than a dedicated hardware device. I actually wrote a program a while back that would listen to an audio input and then send audio files and their transcriptions to a discord server.
Oh cool! That actually seems real cool to test out. You mind giving a name or link to that program/bot?
Thanks! perhaps some future version would be python based cross-platform source code. And ability to control SDR's :) Appreciate the feedback
awesome toy!
Seems interesting, but would like to see a better radio interface. I think it would be nicer for them to just put something like a DB9 or similar rugged connector so it could be connected to a more suitable base radio. I mean, they could still include a cable that connects the DB9 to the standard mic/ptt cable for baofengs.
I'm just curious -- why are you asking for a DB9 rather than, say, a TRRS?
@@boondocktechnologies DB9 is a lot more common and rugged of a connector than a TRRS jack when it comes to integrating two way radio equipment. It's also a lot easier for people to build custom cables and integrate with their own radios. Not to mention it gives you more pins at your disposal. I think it's a neat idea, but I think the hardware implementation could be a lot more rugged and versatile.
@@HiSmartAlarms Huh. I wasn't aware of that. I don't want to sound like I'm asking you to do my homework for me. But this is seriously new information for me. Do you have links/products in mind?
@@boondocktechnologies I build a lot of repeaters, and work/worked in a radio environment. A lot of people build stuff like this around older commercial radios, so having a better interface I think would be more beneficial. Here are some examples of radios I see a lot of people use for stuff like this, and why a DB9 would be more beneficial:
-Kenwood TK7180/8180s have a DB25 accessory connector, would be easy to make an adapter cable
-Older Kenwood radios have an optional accessory connector, but a lot of people just make their own accessory connector and solder them to the pin header inside the radio, and then break out to a DB9.
-Pretty much every Motorola mobile has a 16 or 20 pin accessory connector, which matches the layout to a 2x8 pin header, and a lot of people make cables that adapt them to DB9, and then to a controller or interface of sorts.
-Vertex Standards have a D-Sub connector already included on the back
-TYT THD-9000 radios have a spot for a DB-9 and an integrated header, a lot of people buy the cable/connector assembly and build an interface themselves.
That is just the ones I have seen/dealt with, but I know that a DB-9 would be a lot more rugged in a lot of ways.
With a TRRS you're limited to;
1. RX Audio
2. TX Audio
3. PTT
4. Ground
But with a DB-9, you don't have a janky cable coming off the unit to deal with, there is better shielding and, you don't have to rely on something like VOX to detect a received signal. You could keep the VOX portion as a last resort option but your pinout could be something like:
1. RX Audio
2. TX Audio
3. COS/Busy Input
4. PTT Output
5. Ground
And, 4 more pins that could be used for a data bus, or some other I/O.
I think the concept is cool, but I don't think many people find it very usable in the way it's being advertised. In my opinion, I don't think many people want a clunky box to carry around with their HT just so they can replay a message that they may or may not have missed on an analog repeater network that people rarely use. I think honestly the bigger vantage point of this product is it's keyword notification, and in that case it doesn't matter where the box is (especially since it needs internet for that functionality). So, I think the focus should be more on this being a box that sits at a tower site, or at someone's shack, and monitors local repeaters or whatever. However, a device like this, especially with the way it's designed currently won't last a week at a tower site. Not to mention, there's never WiFi at a tower site, only ethernet, sometimes...
One more mention, if someone uses this with an HT at their house, it's likely gonna sit on the charger while it's sitting around. Baofeng radios are NOTORIOUS for having the chargers create some god awful RF noise, or noise on the audio lines, which will just ruin the audio or transcriptions.
Again, I'm not trying to knock your product or idea. But in my opinion, I think your missing the ball and the potential. Look at the other comments, many people either think this is a dumb idea, or that it is a "toy".
if they want a perspective of a brand new ham i am happy to help haha love your little projects they are very home brew and obtainable for anyone .. i love that ..cheers for your videos mate ..VK4QRM
Thanks for the info. Did not know the device was under development. I have a license, KC2WVB, and it could be useful to me someday. I am not really a big fan of VHF repeaters but this would allow missed simplex to have more use.
That is cool!
So it is a repeater using 1 radio instead of 2
Pretty cool
one thing i would love to see the finished product have is USB C, microUSB is just too fragile and is being phased out on pretty much everything, having to lug around a Micro USB cable just for this would be annoying
I don't disagree. We spun a board that had newer features -- RTC, USB battery charger circuits, etc.... And when they came in, they had fraudulent/counterfeit microcontrollers on them. So we had to trash that batch :( And then we reverted to the prototypes (based on the AI Thinker Dev-Board + Audio interface) so we could keep software development moving forward. In short -- the next version will look very different than this version.
Getting ready for when the solar storms knock out cellphones and internet 😁
static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/weirdalfoil_2322.jpg
Great Video. I believe Baofeng is actually pronounced BoofWang. 😂
They better be switching to USB-C before they start shipping. Micro USB in 2023 is unacceptable!
As it was built with boards available in market, we were limited with what we got. Future version will surely be USB-C :)
Cool
DiY number station
Hah! That's how you end up on a list. ;)
Awesome video Brah. Never knew you were a ham. Will be nice when they get this thing dialed in. KM6QAQ 73
Great video! When are you going to upgrade to Amateur Extra? Get to work! ;)
I don't get on the air enough! Always too busy. But it might be fun to upgrade.
Excellent and fun review. Could this be used with a SDR Trunk to record local police and fire? I live in a fairly densly populated area, west side Cincinnati, Ohio, that frequently has good scanner activity but if I don't have the app up before the sirens start I don't know why the sirens are going off.
If you use a SDR (or two) and some software, you can listen to the entire trunked radio system in Ohio, called MARCS-IP. All of the towers are networked and most Ohio agencies use it. For example, I listened the tower in downtown Columbus and was able to listen to the fire department in Wapakoneta, the folks running the parking lots at CMH, security guards in the parking garage in the capitol building in downtown Columbus, and a prison in Marion. Plus all the local cops and hospitals and fire locally. The software is called SDRTrunk and would give you real-time, Internet-free access to scanner traffic.
I use it on my scanner, not sdr, a uniden scanner. One problem is when it's jumping channels you don't know which channel it catches, though I think my scanner can output the channel over serial so eventually with an API might be able to link them, or just program less channels into your scanner
Let me see if I understand this. It records and transcribes the audio it hears, then drops the transcriptions to the internet?
Locally records and stores to SD, optionally uploads audio to the cloud, transcription occurs in the cloud.
I have a Radtel handheld that uses the same plug, but I'm not sure of the wiring.
The hardware and firmware is documented and we are hoping people diy and bring their own radios and ideas to the system!
@@ElectronicSupersonic Ths radio is being shiped as a Christmas present. or I would find out. I need cataract surgery, and can't see well enough to look at it before it goes into the mail. It is an RT600
i love your videos and haw you make junk in to cool stuff
YA I'm a bot sher
Great. Now i want this
Woohoo!
Dude. Json is easy, it won't take but a single bowl to learn.
this is actually pretty cool, definitely can think of many uses for this in the shack and out of it as well. definitely keen on one when they come out, any idea of the estimated cost?
We will set the price in collaboration with CrowdSupply. We would like to keep it very affordable so as many people can get one as possible.
Its the echo recorder from borderlands
I can see the point of it, which is more than can be said for a lot of these IoT devices.
A lot depends on the price, and the recurring cost of cloud storage and processing.
I wish them well, they seem to be on the ball, software wise. RTC modules are cheap.
All the best.
RTC were in our original design, but we had some supply chain issues. The current version doesn't have a RTC -- the next version likely will!
@@boondocktechnologies I've got one in my Arduino box. 😉
If I could make a suggestion, would it be possible to set it up whereby if it doesn't find its preconfigured wifi access point, it fires up an Adhoc network that runs a configuration program. So it can be modified while away from home, in the field.
@@Xact-ToeBlades Huh? If anyone's getting paid, it sure isn't me. However, my rates are very reasonable, if anyone's offering. 🤫
@@sarkybugger5009 Yeah -- we had a supply-chain issue where we paid for boards with parts that weren't what their top-side-markings indicated they were. And it was a significant amount of money. Those boards had RTCs. That made us revert to the devkit+sidekick model to keep moving forward. By this time next year, (and certainly before) definitely RTCs.
@@Xact-ToeBlades No bots. We've just got a drunken troll doing all this work for free. His comments are making this video really trend! Don't know who he is irl, but I need to buy that guy a beer! (Or a refreshing non-alcoholic beverage)
Its not a commercial use of the radio what ur doin as its educational but also if u go on the end of the 2M band or 70cm band people wont care cause its not on the simplex calling freqs or the repeater I/O as I do range tests being a amateur radio operator myself
I like your longer videos.
Anyhow, I can't think of a reason why *I* would need something like this. While I do fuddle with a radio, I don't actually use it for anything important. I should probably at least try listening to the ISS. That seems like an easy task for me.
@Xact-ToeBlades This is an ad. It's not a real video. It's a paid advertising. For a broken product.
@Xact-ToeBlades Aw crap -- I was botting from the wrong account. Darn, darn, darn. How do I delete these? I confused my boondocktechnologies bot account and my xact-toeblades bot account. And the worst thing is, it's going to boost engagement numbers for everyone.
Listening to the ISS? Heck, don't stop there. Talk to the ISS! That's the fun of Ham Radio. Gabe has done it for $50 worth of equipment.
Here I go boosting engagement even more, @@boondocktechnologies
This is suss as! Imagine putting your voice on the cloud just for some LLM AI to work you out.
2 things I noticed. First the cable from the radio to Boodocks is fixed on the unit side. It would be nice to ha ve a replaceable cable. Second, assuming the companies server is China, having my info stored in China is sketchy
Baofeng was the first hardware target as it's cheap but there's also an audio jack that you can connect the speaker out of many radios to, I currently have an anytone on mine. We had to target something out of the gate as every radio will have different levels and such of audio input and output. We are hoping to create a compatibility chart as more people test it on their radios. It's all open source and you can unsolder the header and substitute your own for a different radio.
@@ElectronicSupersonic I am not talking about the male end of the cord. I am talking about the PERMANENT connection on the unit side. They DO break from time to time. I’m suggesting a DOUBLE ended cable that IS FIELD REPLACEABLE
@@levinef ahh. We have been having that internal discussion, one of our developers is big on the digirig standard which is trrs, but the sticking point is the cost of the cables. These handset cables which are Kenwood/baofeng on one end and flying lead for soldering are under $5 and the trrs one is like 15-25, though it does also have the benefit people can buy cables for other radios and plug into the trrs. We are thinking a combination for the next run with the hard cable and trrs compatibility.
Also the servers are currently hosted on AWS
@@ElectronicSupersonicAnd every other three letter agency that is sitting on their servers 😅
Very cool. I do very much want.
Its an interesting experience hearing someone objectively smarter than me both be confused by and mispronounce a JSON file. I guess that just points to the fact that we are all specialists in something or another in the engineering family.
Hi Gabe,I was thinking about starting in this rabbit hole of radio signals and I have a perfect laptop for that (dell XFR)and a bunch of antennas,what linux distro and apps are the best for that? Thx a lot
I mostly use Ubuntu, unless it's an older laptop that needs something lightweight. I know there are some ham and radio-specific distributions, but I haven't used any of them. I tried a couple on an older tablet and they wouldn't boot, so I went with Mint on that device.
@@saveitforparts Thanks,I will try ubuntu,this thing runs w10 easily
Love your videos,greetings from Spain
Very fascinating!
Basically a simplex repeater
Hi, while it can be used as a simplex repeater, our intention is to use it to capture messags, and monitor keywords.
It's a tad more sophisticated than that. I encourage you to take a look around the site. Or at the 60-second video on the crowdsupply home page.
Be sure to look at the regulations regarding unattended transmissions. RX is OK.
Thanks Vlad! Just an FYI -- we have a FCC license challenge in the works so only licensed HAMS will ever even have the option to transmit on in-band frequencies.
@@boondocktechnologies you mean "so only licensed US HAMS will ever even have the option to use all the features of our hardware or transmit on in-band frequencies." of course, right? :(
@@boondocktechnologiesWill the device identify itself regularly (or after every transmission) using voice or CW with the control operator's call sign? Also, will the unit have some sort of failsafe to prevent transmissions over 3 minutes? I would recommend that you look at the FCC Part 97 rules regarding auxiliary stations. It would be wise to make sure your device is setup in a way where users are using it in a legal manner.
@@rumproast2000 First of all, thank you for caring and providing useful feedback. We appreciate it!
Scheduling identifying transmissions is no problem whatsoever. But I think what's missing is the "when it makes sense to do so" element, so I've put in a feature request with the software team. Right now the software would transmit the message every x minutes whether it needs to or not.
We can, of course, program in a "stop transmitting after x minutes" and indeed, the maximum record time now is 3 minutes. But boondock Echo is not an amateur radio. It's an amateur radio controller. IMHO, the failsafe needs to be the Time Out Timer on the radio. We need to be the option before the failsafe. But your comment has inspired me to go back to part 97, and helped to realize it's more than just "transmit every xxxx minutes whether you need to or not!" So I thank you!
@@colind6797 No. If you've got a license in another country you can transmit too! We just don't know how all that works yet. So the option is going to be "enter your callsign", and if we can auto-authenticate it, great! If we can't, we'll have someone manually verify it. "But that's not fair to non-US hams!" Perhaps. But we're a new company. We don't know how to verify licenses in every country. And if it makes you feel any better, our US verification percentage is right around 15%, the FCC API fails a lot.
To your second point: This thing is a transmitter troll's dream. Take our device and a baofeng and a car battery and you could interfere with fire/ems for weeks, and that potentially could cost lives. And if they do it with randomly scheduled short transmissions, it'll be darn near impossible to foxhunt. We absolutely do not want that. So we're asking for a license. (Amateur, GMRS, etc.) before we enable transmission. Not going to solve every problem, but it'll solve a lot of them.
YOU COULD JUST USE A VOICE ACTIVATED RECORDER LIKE THEY USE FOR PHONES ?
YOU MEAN LIKE AN ANSWERING MACHINE? SURE, SURE YOU COULD DO THAT. BUT IF YOU'RE HARD OF HEARING, THIS CAN TRANSCRIBE FOR YOU. YOU CAN READ THE MESSAGES. AND WHAT'S GREAT IS THAT YOU DON'T HAVE TO SHOUT TO BE HEARD. that's right -- you can transcribe a whisper.
its a glorified digital voice recorder@@Xact-ToeBlades
No. its an ESP32 inside it. But a good try! All designs are code is open sourced. But keep your 20 bucks.@@Xact-ToeBlades
Tune it in between 162,400 MHz and 162,500 MHz. This is Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEAs).
Ordered mine about a month ago says it should be here in july.
what if you connected the ECHO to a 2M/70CM radio, set to a simplex frequency with the tone squelch set? Only users on THAT frequency with THAT tone are being recorded. A "personal" HAM radio voicemail system for when your away from the shack. Yes/No? thanks, KJ7QEB
Lots of possibilities with this! The callsign text recognition is also a way to get personal voicemails (as long as it works properly!). I've got another video coming out today where I mention it again.
I have that same linoleum in my 1925 kitchen.HOW DO YOU CLEAN IT? (Also would love to collaborate if you're looking for a neat puzzle!)
Light mopping or one of the damp Swiffer pad thingys seem to do the job. Most of the upstairs is Linoleum, it's easier to clean than carpet!
I have an answering machine already, its called a paket tnc
Boot loop on TX means its going to want some rf shielding.
Just read the response about why this was happening, rf was not the problem.
@boondocktechnologys hows the ai handle phonetic call signs?
Is "Kilo Lima One Foxtrot India" going to trigger as KL1FI?
@@devinholland2189 I'll say "decent". We've got two problems currently with transcription. First -- we designed the audio board for speaker-output from radio. If you plug in a line-level out, our circuit overattenuates the audio and the signal level is really, really close to the noise floor. In that case, the AI just "remembers it's training" and flat out hallucinates. We've got a couple solutions in the works for that. One that bypasses the attenuator circuit, the other that deletes hallucinations, and another that helps operators set correct audio levels. The other issue we're seeing relates to NATO vs. Police alphabets. NATO "Kile Echo" seems okay enough. But LAPD-style "William Mary Mike" seems to struggle a bit. Although to be fair to the transcription engine, it can pull more correct words out of the air than I can when some of those dispatchers mumble into the mic.
@@boondocktechnologies will the software still run on just the dev board or is the daughter board required now?
@@devinholland2189 Software runs on the dev-board just fine. If you want a receive-only device with no LED indicators, you can use the dev-board (AIThinker Audio Kit). You do need the daughter board to transmit and get status LEDs. Basically the dev-board shorts the audio grounds together -- which is how radios are triggered to transmit. We had to toss in an opto-isolator for PTT.
@@devinholland2189 It will run on the dev-board. All you lose are the indicator lights and the ability to transmit. That's it. Everything else works. This will allow people to create their own devices in countries where we can't sell them. Or in case our CrowdSupply campaign overshoots our production run.
Could you do an review on the talkpod a36plus? Just got one and they're amazing and FCC and ham red certified 😄
Actually, ham radios are actually never Part 97 certified, just Part 15.
No need for any paranoia about the fcc for doing that review. It takes them months to react to actual illegal frequency usage. 😅
We're more worried about a new user listening to fire/police frequencies and accidentally transmitting there -- interfering with emergency services. There's a PTT disable switch on the side and the license check is a 2nd line of defense.
Just because you probably won't get caught isn't a reason to act illegally.
Can you create a similar device with an arduino or a esp32 devkit of your own ?
Download a different firmware like Extreme or one of the others.
The FCC frowns on commercial use of ham radio because they’re not getting a cut.
Seams like a neat toy but not very compelling for me honestly. Much of the functionality could probably be implemented in some code on a RPI or something and just using some GPIO for audio detection. Not sure if the RPI does audio in on the jack.. Only thing it really has going for it is the speach detection stuff which again could be done locally without sending data to a 3rd party server. I think it would be neater if it did stuff like auto detecting the channel your on or swiching channels for you so you coulod listen to more then a single one. Again code that does silimar stuff already with SDR and RPI setup.
Who does Boondock use for their STT?
A locally run installation of OpenAI's Whisper (On our server, no way can this ESP32 variant run it locally. Have to wait for a future version if you want transcription on device)
@@boondocktechnologies Makes sense. Is that cheap to run? How's it do on noisy radio audio?
@@mgevirtz Sorry I missed the comment. If you run it on OpenAI's servers, it gets rather expensive rather quickly (remember we're trying to support a lot of streams, so if you're just messing around at home, I'm sure it won't be too bad -- but definitely want to monitor your daily usage so you don't end up spending $20-30 a day). If the audio level is high enough, it's just fine on noisy radio -- better than I am. But if the audio level is too close to the noise floor, it doesn't matter how clear it is. In short -- it needs a certain bit-depth to be effective.
Its not super expensive. on a shared server, its manageable. it does need some work for noisy audio. @@mgevirtz
US hams only? 😢
Only because we don't know how to distribute internationally. We're on a path to sell it through Mouser. They might solve the problem for us!
Do I see a micro USB port on the device? C’mon people, it’s 2023, USB-C is de facto standard.
Soon will be upgraded to USB C :)
O wait this takes internet to work ... 🤔
The base functionality works without the internet: Record/Play/Transmit can happen without the internet. Fancy features like transcription/translation/IFTTT triggering does require the internet.
You can surely use it fully offline. Intenet adds many cool features though.
@@boondocktechnologies I like this type of gear that could be a life line in a disaster ( local or global )
@@kevinleee3408 We hope so!
I'm not buying any non-USBC device... come on, get with the times Boondock
Very soon :)
sucks the ham world is dying off but after talking to a few of the older people i can see why, they wanna be an goodol boys club and anyone new is seen as someone pissing on their porch.
With a name like glitter fart...I can see why you think that!
I don't know that it is. I think the new generation is just using it in new ways. Lots of data out there all the dang time. I'll agree with you that 2m repeaters aren't seeing as much use as when I was a kid. But cell phones didn't exist then. No cell phones are taking the place of quick person-to-person communication. But there's still nets, still emergency usage, etc.
found the guy who is about to die with no friends @@bierbarrel
notwhen the repeaters go down and no one is around to replace them, but plent of cell towers and other data sites that couldnt care less about ham. @@markjarrodhughes How many new club members do you have in your ham club in the last 5 yrs? i doubt its more than those who have died. i dont say this to be an ass but just literal numbers, I'd love to get into ham and intend to get a call sign and repeater license but talking to any of you "old guys" about anything is like telling a delusional old man your not on their grass while you walk by on the sidewalk
Got my NC Tech ticket just after graduating highschool. But since no one around my age was on, it got boring with most traffic talking about their radios. I still have my license for econm.
Could this be used with gmrs simplex?
Probably, I haven't done much with GMRS, it always seemed like it was for kids at the mall but I guess it has more of a following now.
11:45 you showed your callsign, don’t know if your trying to just give us your address but, i hope you fix it lol
Oops, I was trying to avoid that, thanks for the heads up 😅
Murs has annoying data noise and Walmart and zone 1.
What's the legality of using this? With an unattended transmit capability, it feels like a grey area...
The FCC has clear rules in place. If you want to transmit, we need to confirm that you are a licensed Amateur Radio operator. If you're transmitting audio that you've personally recorded, like your voice or Morse code, it's similar to the voice recording and playback feature found on many radios. For instance, I can record a "CQ CQ CQ DE KE6WOB" message and play it on a loop with my ICOM IC-705 radio without any issues. We're simply adding this capability to radios that don't have it built-in.
Now, we also have the capability to take audio from one source, send it over the internet, and then broadcast it from another Boondock Echo device. In this case, it's likely that you would need to register it as a repeater.
There are other features, like using your phone to monitor the dock, which is similar to using remote rig software. The specific rules can be found in Part 97, but I can't provide a link to it here due to CZcams's content restrictions, which could lead to the deletion of this entire comment.
Website goes down = brick.
No. If the website goes down, you lose transcription/translation/email until the website comes back up. (And future versions will do more and more on device). All audio files are stored locally and uploaded and processed once connectivity is restored.
Not good.
As soon as one has to register and access some website it is a no no.
Just like other electronics with cloud storage, CCTV to refrigerators.
Once the company decide not to support the product anymore, or go bankrupt, your device is useless.
Hi. I understand what you are saying. The code is OneSource, You can build the system on your own. However it might be more expensive than paying small monthly fee.
We've open-sourced the software/hardware/firmware files. So, in the unfortunate event that we go bankrupt, someone else can carry the torch. But there's even better news -- we're not going to drive over to your house and extract the firmware from the device with a tesla-coil. It would continue to function with the latest version of the firmware.
Really dislike the FCC database check. Limits to US only and even if it doesn’t it is annoying for non US users
We really dislike the FCC database check too. It doesn't work 75% of the time! Very frustrating. Just an FYI -- we can still manually authenticate you. Just go into the back end and flip a switch.
It is still a paid promotion.
I don't make the rules, don't even enforce, just noticing it.
@GeomancerHT, Gabe is an awesome guy. We love his channel, and we reached out to him to be a beta tester, and give his feedback as a Ham user; without any conditions. :) At Boondock, we are bunch of guys trying to build something useful. And in the same spirit, we have openSourced everything. We don't have that kind of money to pay :). Gabe agreed to beta test the device, and help us evolve the solution. And he was kind enough to make a video about it. We value his feedback more than anything else.
worthless device if it depends on the cloud. Stand alone in firmware would be a selling point. Too many people have bee screwed with ewaste from companies that went under, or started charging for access to their services.
Couple of things. It does work without the cloud, just with fewer features. For example, the IFTTT integration requires cloud services -- but that's true of any IFTTT integration. Base features work without the cloud.
Also -- the firmware is open source. If we go under, (which we don't believe we will), the devices can still function.
@@boondocktechnologies Thanks for the positive input.
I agree with your point. But we open sourced everything, so you can easily build it for personal use; in case Boondock tries to charge you more than it's worth.