I got digirig and my Yaesu FTM-200DR working with the new receive and transmit m17-tools “M17-RTX Gui” on my Win 11 x64 computer. I used the digirig Yaesu MiniDin10 9600-baud cable (must be 9600 baud for M17). I used SDR++ with its M17 module installed to set the deviation on both my hotspot and the FTM-200 radio.
M17-RTX Gui Gains tab: Mic Gain is for your actual microphone. Rx Gain sets the volume into the radio interface (digirig in my case). Speaker Gain sets the volume out of the speakers you listen with. Tx Gain sets the volume into your radio and therefor the transmit deviation. I set the Gains to: Mic Gain 1.0, Rx Gain 0.47, Speaker Gain 1.0, Tx Gain 0.84
My Gain Settings
First thing I did was set the Windows Sound levels to 100 (max) for my desktop microphone, the digirig Mic (digirig In) and digirig Speakers (digirig Out). Turn off any effects such as spatial or 3D sound.
I set the Rx Gain by adjusting M17-RTX Gui Rx Gain slider during reception from the hotspot until I got about 95% deviation shown on the M17-RTX Gui Demodulator page. I set Tx Gain by adjusting its slider until the SDR++ M17 graph shows the transmit lines on top of the reference lines.
SDR++ M17 display. This shows a pretty good deviation setting. Transmit lines in the display overlay the reference lines.
My Audio tab. The ATR USB microphone is my desk mic. Microphone (USB PnP Sound Device) is the digirig input. Desk_Speakers are my desktop speakers. Speakers (USB PnP Sound Device) is the digirig output
My Rig Control tab
I’m showing a BER of 0.0% when communicating with my hotspot and audio is good. I get a chirp from M17-RTX Gui about every 3 seconds when the demodulator is active but with no signal present. Encryption using M17-RTX Gui works great with all the gain settings set for 97% deviation. Encrypted audio sounds the same as normal (as it should). I did have to add “AllowEncryption=1” in the M17 section of MMDVM.ini just after “TXHang”.
I set the deviation of the hotspot by adjusting the value of MMDVMHost/Modem/M17TXLevel. For me a value of 40 gave me the best deviation plot on SDR++ M17 display. I used M17TXLevel to adjust the deviation because I had already set the MMDVM DMR deviation and didn’t want to affect it by changing the global TXLevel.
Hope this helps some of you get on the air with M17 using a digirig and a 9600-baud capable radio.
Rob Robinette K9OJ