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Linking update: DMR is back, plus a live status page

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Quite a bit has changed at GB3OA over the past week, so here is where things stand.

A correction first: the Wires-X room number

Our linking page has been showing the wrong Wires-X room number. It said 05324, which was the old room. The correct room is GB-SW-LANCS, number 05239, and has been since June 2025. If you have 05324 saved in your radio or your node, that is why you could not get in. The pages have now been corrected.

The number changed because the room itself moved, from a node at the keeper’s QTH onto the node at the repeater. In Wires-X a room takes its number from the node hosting it, so when the room moved, the number moved with it. That is also why dialling the old number gets you nowhere rather than a helpful error: you are asking for a room that no longer exists on that node.

DMR is available again, via XLX840

Some of you will remember that back in April 2024 we withdrew both the SW-LANCS YSF reflector and the XLX704 reflector. They had given us technical trouble and, frankly, they were little used, so at the time removing them was the simpler option.

Both are now back, and we believe the new arrangement works well.

  • C4FM and Fusion YSF reflector GB-SW-LANCS, number 11704
  • DMR XLX840, module A, talkgroup 6 on timeslot 2, via DMRGateway

Please note it is TG 6, not TG 4001. The 4000 range is used for switching module, not for talking, so if you transmit on 4001 your hotspot will happily take your audio and then quietly discard it. This one catches people out.

Whichever way you come in, you end up in the same conversation. A call on DMR reaches a handheld on the 2m repeater, and back again.

D-Star: XLX840 has no hardware transcoder, so the D-Star addresses will connect but carry no audio. Please do not spend an evening debugging your radio.

A live status page

There is now a status page covering the whole linked system:

https://gb-sw-lancs.gb3oa.org.uk

It shows whether the repeater, the Wires-X room, the YSF reflector and the DMR link are connected and talking to each other, and it lists who is connected at the moment. It updates itself every minute, and there is a Status link in the menu at the top of every page.

It shows that the systems are linked and talking, which is not quite the same as proving audio is crossing between them. But if something is obviously down, the page will say so.

Full details of how to connect are on the linking page.

73, the GB3OA team.

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SWLANCS cross link bridge down…

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UPDATE 2nd October 2025 – The new PC has been configured and installed. The YSF <> Wires-X RF bridge is now functional again.

UPDATE 26th September 2025 – It looks like (finally) the PC has died, as a result, he cross link between the Wires-X room and the YSF Reflector is down again. Configuration of the replacement will start as soon as possible. Both the Wires-X room and YSF Reflector are functional, they’re just not bridged.

UPDATE 13th March 2024 – It appears the PC we thought had died has an intermittent fault. For now at least, it appears to be working again. It’s now back in service but for how long, who knows. In the meantime we’re looking to source a better spec PC than the spare we have so it can be replaced with something a little more robust.

The Windows PC that supports cross linking between the Wires-X room and YSF reflector is down. Spare hardware is available but needs configuring.

Work will start on this today.

73, the GB3OA team.

SWLANCS cross link bridge down… Read More »

A Wires-X Update from GB3OA

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Not quite sure where to begin with this — it’s been a challenging few days! As many of you will know, the PC running Wires-X at the repeater site gave up the ghost a few weeks ago. When sourcing its replacement, we opted to take a slightly different approach and invest in a better-spec refurbished machine. We settled on a Lenovo ThinkCentre M910q Mini PC (i3-6100T, 8GB RAM, 128GB SSD) running Windows 11. Since it only needs to run Wires-X, this should more than meet the requirements.

A quick note on background: even before this recent failure, we’d been dealing with assorted Wires-X linking issues for a year or two — but frustratingly, they were always intermittent. Everything would run smoothly for days, and then the dreaded socket timeouts and connection dropouts would return without warning. We always assumed the problem lay within the wider Wires-X network, as others seemed to experience similar issues.

Once the new PC was configured and installed on-site, things took a turn — but not for the better. The problems persisted, and if anything, became more frequent. Even AI was consulted (with mixed results — some helpful suggestions, some wild guesses!). The core issue was that we couldn’t get the remote node (which handles the RF bridge to the YSF reflector) to work reliably with the Wires-X room running at the repeater. On top of that, audio received via the repeater’s input wasn’t being passed on to connected remote nodes.

After many hours of testing, troubleshooting, and yes — faffing — we realised something important: the version of Wires-X installed on the new PC was two versions newer than what was running on the remote node. Once we updated the software on the remote system, things finally started behaving.

In the spirit of caution, we asked AI whether this was likely to be the root cause. Here’s what it had to say:

  1. Version mismatches are a known cause of routing failures and unstable connections in Wires-X.
  2. Firmware 1.56 includes bug fixes related to node connectivity, NAT traversal, and audio stream handling.
  3. The symptoms we saw (e.g. one-way audio and failure to pass RF input to remote nodes) are consistent with issues reported by others on older versions.

Sounds plausible — and the takeaway is clear: keep your software up to date.

    🗨️ Get Involved

    It’s worth mentioning that GB3OA remains very under-used. We’d love to hear more activity! We’re even thinking about starting a fortnightly evening net for local users. Interested? Let us know your thoughts — we’d love to get something going.

    Best regards,

    The GB3OA Team

    A Wires-X Update from GB3OA Read More »

    GB3OA – Partial restoration

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    It appears the Wires-X PC had withdrawn service.

    When an HRI-200 is physically connected to the repeater, the repeater has to be switched into a different mode. What had happened was the PC was not booting, this prevented the repeater from working. This only happens when the repeater is booted from cold, but unfortunately a power cycle on site caused the whole set up to hang.

    We’ve put the repeater back into basic mode with the result that it’s now fine but obviously it’s working without any linking.

    A new PC will be sourced in due course.

    The GB3OA Team.

    GB3OA – Partial restoration Read More »