A few questions

[J R]

My current set-up is a G90 and a digirig.

I've used this for APRS, JS8, FT8, VarAC, ...

I am paying attention to when to use upper or lower digital modes.  I have no processing on at radio or computer.

One thing I haven't seen is whether or not to have "Listen to this device" in the audio recording tab of sound devices settings checked or unchecked, although I don't think this would make much difference?

While running FreeDV, I have heard a voice, incredibly clear but not for long, a few times.

As with a lot of ham related audio, gain structure is incredibly important, and I am making to sure to not starve or clip any audio.  What should I be looking for in the waterfall?  50/50 red/green?

It could be band conditions, unlikely, but I am not able to make a QSO.

Also, in the program, my SNR meter is empty, should it be?

Attached are my audio assignments.

Any guidance greatly appreciated.  Look forward to many QSOs with yall.

Jason Reilley 

KO6CJM

73

[Mooneer Salem]

Hi Jason,

The SNR meter being blank unless there's a signal actively being decoded is expected behavior. There's no way to calculate one without that being true, unfortunately.

Re: audio levels, we've been aiming for peaks around +/- 0.4 in the various plots (at least on TX). For RX, you should be good as long as the level indicator on the left isn't indicating that you're clipping. 

Anyway, hope all of that helps!

Thanks,

-Mooneer K6AQ

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[scott w]

Jason,

 I have a G90 as well.

Re the listen-to device, if selected for USB audio IN you'll hear the digital hash from the radio (if receiving a freedv signal) which will interfere acoustically with any decoded audio, so usually that remains unchecked. If selected for the user microphone, if will likely cause an acoustic feedback loop, obviously undesirable.

 Re USB IN level. I have found on my setup, that I get best decode when the level shows "too high" and probably clipping. Don't ask how that can be but I've compared on dozens of signals to confirm. 

One difference in my setup compared to most is that I'm using the "headphone" jack speaker out on the front left of the G90. This allows me to fine tune the receive audio level on the fly from the FLRig control app.

 Also, as you've no doubt discovered, if using a more recent FW version on G90, the TX/RX audio via the ACC port is only active when using the USB-D or LSB-D digital mode. I have no idea why they did that, makes no sense. I use the rig remotly for regular SSB also and so cant tx if in normal mode. I set my USB-D and LSB-D to around 1600 hz trial and error using the new worthless (imo) filter system they came up with, fwiw.

Hope that helps

Lmk if other G90 questions. 

Scott

KD8VNU

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[scott w]

Jason

 Also I forgot to mention, for the G90 I get my best SNR values using an RF gain of 1 (lowest), no AGC, and no preamp. I find that frequency offsets/variations kill the RX/TX pretty quick, so as a test you could also try tuning 20 to 50 hz up or dn to see if that helps receive SNR. Generally most modern rigs are spot on unless user sets RIT/XIT offset or something.

Scott

KD8VNU

On Thu, Apr 23, 2026, 10:32 PM J R <jpre...@gmail.com> wrote:

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[J R]

Thank you so much for the replies.

Scott, did I read that right?  A rf gain of 1?  Is there make-up gain somewhere?  My waterfall is almost black.  Might you be using a digirig?  I've noticed with mine, if I increase the volume, it will turn off at a certain point.  Like it is getting compressed at a low threshold, at about 30% on the slider in the sound properties recording tab.

Still no QSOs.

I will get the occasional one to two second voice that sounds incredibly clear.  

Again, thank you for the quick replies and advice.

Jason Reilley

KO6CJM

73

[scott w]

Jason,

 Correct, RF Gain at lowest.

Keep in mind (unless Digirig works differently), that the volume control from the front knob of G90 and the CI-V commands for volume Digirig would be sending, are for the G90 speaker out/headphone out only. The ACC port has a separate internal menu Line Out adjust from 1 to 15 I believe. (But I'm sure you're familiar with it since using other digital modes). It could be that the headphone out has higher AF gain by default (in theory it should) and may explain why I get better drive into my USB audio in encoder at low RF gain. (If your local area electrical is quiet you can probably get away with RF gain at 10. ) I always have to check my NB is off since I use for SSB analog receive as well.

 Make sure the USB-IN device Audio level can be raised until you get half meter deflection or better on the FreeDV "Level" meter below SNR. If tied to your ACC port try raising the LINE OUT on G90 to 15.

 Screen shot shows receiving a weak signal that was close to full copy (ranged from -5 to plus 3 SNR). SNRs of 0 are usually copyable. But note the FreeDV Level meter. Pegged. YMMV. It's a function of the specific relationship of the USB encoder, windows/os ver, windows/os device settings and FreeDV. Different mfg USB audio encoders can have wildly different front end gains and encoding properties. Some have a specific Line In mode (vs mic level in) and some are just one big range in to adjust. Of course the USB encoder side AGC must be off as well, plus any enhancements. You said no processing so you should be good there. Try a different USB audio encoder maybe? (If using the Xiegu direct USB to ACC DE-19 then things get a bit more complicated to try other audio setups).

Finally it could be that your signals are really too low, do you get a lot of regular SSB voice stations on 40m ranging from just above noise to S9+? And as we saw a couple weeks ago on the net, thunderstorms and adjacent analog SSB voice stations rip up FreeDV signals to shreds. So that's something to consider.

 Lmk what FW your G90 is running. 1.81 here for base and control head. After 1.78 I believe is when they added the "digital modes". Newer versions headphone out level is reduced and the rig just seems less noisy overall as well.

(But they killed the receive bandwidth adjust. Which was like any other rig, set center freq, set width. Now, each mode has a fixed width-limited amount that can be tweaked slightly. Such a pain and borderline unusable.) (End rant). Overall it's a very versatile rig, there's not much it can't do.

 Hope that helps

Scott

KD8VNU 

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[scott w]

Jason

 I just realized you're using Digirig "the hardware" Sorry. I confused the FLdigi software with it somehow duh. I use a CE-19 with the G90 and it allows me to roll my own USB encoder decoder solution at expense of rats nest of cabling lol. I use FLRig ver 1.46 then for control from the windows 10 side. 

Scott

On Sun, Apr 26, 2026, 2:26 AM J R <jpre...@gmail.com> wrote:

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[J R]

Wow.  Thank you for the advice and being quick with it.

I am thinking I have a G90 with bad sensitivity?  I've compared my station with a nearby station, also on a G90, on PSK reporter.  I know it is not necessarily an apples to apples comparison, but....  I haven't made any decent voice QSOs.  The three I've made I struggled with intelligibility.  I've measured my antenna with G90, VNA, and a friend's fancy [forget name] and the results on all three look pretty darned good, really good, when considering the possibility of the measurements might be off a little in either direction.  84' end fed.  I am making good contacts on FT8, JS8, some VarAC, but not voice.

I have been poking around in fldigi.  Pretty powerful looking software.  What I can't figure out is the RSID detector.  RSID supposed to show "video"(a stamp) of mode type in waterfall?  Which mode am I listening to?  CW, pretty straight forward but the 80 or so other modes it supports, pretty amazing and again not sure which mode I am listening to.  

I have a CE-19 as well, but it introduced a ton of noise into my system.  I should remake break out cable much shorter which might lessen noise?  I already had a digirig and found it to be really quiet.  When you say " my own USB encoder decoder solution", what are you doing?  I know what you mean by a rats nest.  I kept the cables that came with the CE-19 at full length as I like to keep everything intact, can't uncut cables.  So yes, rats nest.  For control I use built in hamlib in FreeDV, seems to work great, and even throws side band in the correct place and in digital mode.  Are you using flrig to control width of band?  I am running PC and G90 off a Yeti 6000, so isolated.

This is my first HF rig, so listening and encountering a problem and knowing what to do quickly is not quite there yet?

This Saturday a club member is going to bring their G90 over and we will see.  I am not sure what else to do?  Pretty stumped here.  I'd like to make some voice contacts and particularly get FreeDV working.

I almost forgot to ask.  Your GUI looks different than mine.  On you on windows?

Again, a big thanks for the help.

Jason Reilley

KO6CJM

73

[J R]

FW is 1.81.

Thank you!

Jason 

KO6CJM

On Sunday, April 26, 2026 at 6:48:14 AM UTC-7 scott w wrote:

[scott w]

Jason

 I'm wondering if maybe I can take this off-grid from the discussion group since things are veering more rig specific, can I reply to your email shown on your QRZ.com page? Or send from your preferred email to what is shown below.

 Thanks 

Scott

(My call sign)@g m a i l . c o m

Kd8vnu

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[scott w]

Jason

So the FW seems fine there.

I think your idea of getting another rig side by side on same antenna system would be a good sanity check. Also what version of FreeDV are you running and I'm assuming you have the mode set to RadeV1 which is what nearly everyone is using.

 I took another look at the waterfall pic you sent and something didn't seem right. 

I wonder what's causing all those evenly spaced vertical lines? I didn't see those in mine at any level. It should look more like the waterfall in the pic I sent previously. It's almost like the Digirig is not seeing the correct audio source or some kind of computer hash noise is getting in there. With RF gain at 50% and line out set to 10, and windows USB Digirig device input level set to 50% you should see a red to green spread of waterfall noise tuned to any spot on 40 where no signal. If tuned to a SSB analog voice freq, you should see black sections when the voice peaks are active. Clicking "switch to analog" should allow you to hear what is coming into FreeDV from rig. If doesn't sound the same as what comes from the rig's speaker then there is definitely a problem. Also playback the wav file of encoded RadeV1 from the FreeDV menu just as a sanity check that from FreeDV decode to your output speaker and waterfall is operating/showing correctly.

 I just use an Amazon spec'd USB 3.5mm audio in/out adapter, the out put going to the CE-19, and the into though is connected to the speaker out. Then the "blue" control USB cable to the comm port on the front head unit. Aka rats nest of cabling. 

I think I tried FLdigi once but it didn't work for my application.

 For control , FLrig 1.4.6 is only one that works (is stable) for me for various applications, and I use it locally and remotely via a remote desktop application called RustDesk to my phone.

 My windows UI is set to high contrast mode. 

-Scott

Kd8vnu

 

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[Jason]

Yeah.  That sounds great.

Jason

73

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Warmly,
Jason

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