The CF-28 F.A.Q. - Read me before posting

Toughbook, I am looking at getting spare parts for the 28 I have now and maybe get another to work on. I use my 28 now for amature radio and it works GREAT though I would love to get a CF-18 for the tablet function. This is a great forum both with the Panasonic and the other groups. Thanks for all the help so far...

 

parahawk13... Let me phrase my question a different way... What specific parts are you looking for? Or do you want to buy doubles of everything just in case?

How do you use the CF-28 with Amateur Radio? Just curious... My Dad used to be a Ham. He was the one who got me taking things apart to see what made them work. I inherited my "I MUST HAVE THAT" gene from him.

 

Toughbook, I want at least a 2nd 28 to toy with so I can keep my primary one for my Ham radio. I would also like to get a CF-18. I use my 28 for all parts of my Ham radio, APRS, D-STAR (digital) SSTV, mapping and to program my radios....You should get in the hobby, it goes well with computers..PM me if you need info..

 

Just a heads up on cf-18's parahawk
The cf-18 touchscreen model has a serial port like the cf-28's
The cf-18 digitizer has no com port
Thats important to note if you are programing radios



Alex

 

Tomcat, Thanks for the info. If need be I can use a USB to serial adapter, which I need to use on my ePC...

Kurt

 

Hi I had the 30 gig HD in my CF-28S3JGZKM crash and I replaced it with IDE 160 gig anyway , I lost all my data and I had no boot disk so I bought one off the web, and my computer now boots up from my cd drive but I is not seeing my HD. Can somebody please tell me how to get it to see my Hd so I can get it formated.

 

Try to reseat the hard drive caddy in the laptop. If it did not make a connection it will not see the drive.

 

You would probably get a better response to this question in the main forum... As BigGame said... Try reseating the hard drive... You might also want to check the boot order in the BIOS...

 

Thanks for the info, should be plenty to get my recently acquired CF-28 up and running.

 

I recently purchased a CF-28 and the rubber power supply port cover is warn to the point of not staying shut. Does anyone know where I can get a replacement rubber cover for the power port? Thanks.

 

Ebay is the best place... They sell them for a couple of bucks at Heatlandsi.com... But then nail you with $20 for shipping. (No matter the size)

 

I recently have gotten my hands on a number of CF-28 Toughbooks, all of which have the Sierra B300 analog aircard. I was wondering how to get it to work on the ham frequencies and any software needed to do so. I have so far been unable to find the air card in the device manager, the power button on the front shows that it is powered on and working properly, I think. I am pretty sure however that the card is a com port but I do not know.

 

flegelenator,
That's a mouthful, welcome to the forum. You will need to find the driver/software app. for the aircard. I don't know anything about the service. Try Sierra first and then start looking through the Drivers and Manuals sticky. Good luck,
CAP

 

Flegelenator

have you found anyone who has successfuly transitioned any AMPS gear to work on ham frequencies? I've been curious about doing it, but I suspect it would require both hardware modifications and a fairly major firmware re-write to pull off. The effort required to get it done has always seemed much greater than the benefit you would get.

nine

 

Nine:

No I have not, however I have heard some rumors that there is custom software (which I have been unable to locate) that uses the aircard to transmit and receive on at least some of the ham frequencies. One forum I read said that there was some antenna modification, but he did not go into detail about how or any other modifications.

 

You'll probably get a better respose to this question is you place your question in the main forum and not in a CF-28FAQ sticky....

 

Fleg -

The RIM/CDPD cards operate in a reserved frequency range that is not available for public usage and I'm pretty sure they're hard-coded to not operate outside this range. While in theory you COULD write an app to talk to them like any other packet MODEM, you'd be operating in a spectrum that could have you hauled off in irons...

mnem
Why is this dwagon wearing a ski mask?

 

mnem

You are correct. However, there is a US amateur radio band from 902-928 MHz. The CDPD band is roughly 825-901 and 935-940 MHz. Theoretically, it should be possible to modify the firmware, and make the radio work in the amateur band. You would also need to rewrite the firmware to make it operate in a peer-to-peer (or even better, Mesh!) mode, which might actually be the bigger challenge. The other half of this is that you need someone to talk to and at 900 MHz, they better be fairly close (in amateur radio terms anyway) They would need a similar modem, modified in similar ways.

It's certainly an intriguing possibility

nine

 

Why, yes, certainly... a whole 'nuther area of exciting new crime...

*Cackles*

mnem
It wasn't entirely a disaster.
I got stabbed! Right here!
You also lined up exciting new crime...

 

Thank you Thank you Thank you,,, I love this site ive been reading all through , of course ive got a ways to go b-4 i read it all," if thats possible" .
I just got my touchscreen up an running YES thanks Modly and to Cap and all the others who have put so much time in here .. Holiday

 

HELP ,, THANKS ,, 802.11 a/b/g wireless mod_ CF-28 1ghz Ive got my Engenius Senao EMP-8602+s 600mw card and am waiting on rubber duck ext ant an cable u.fl rp sma pigtail,, so im looking thru the threads and asking did i miss something DO I ALSO NEED TO INSTALL THE 3 COM CARD .. you SEE i honestly dont know what a 3 com card is what it does or which one i would need ??? I hate to ask this but im a newbie that needs clarity...Thanks again..

 

Another CF-28 question ?? the old dail up phone jack connections can they be removed to allow more room to work with the hidden pcmcia card ( provided one sealed the area back up ) ???

 

Of course you CAN remove those jacks; there's no end to the damage you can do with a Dremel. As for the 3Com card; if you're going to get rid of the LAN & MODEM jacks, you don't need to worry about it. We use the 3Com Combo card to free up one mini-PCMCIA slot without losing the LAN or MODEM connections.

mnem
Typing with your thumbs is a wholly unnatural act...

 

Holiday... Yes... You DO have more reading to do...

I think the FAQ pretty much answers all the questions if you start from the beginning. If not, and you search and find something else of value, just let me know and I'll add it here. If we keep asking more and more questions and the thread gets longer and longer... Nobody will actually want to read to find the answers... So... If you have a CF-28 question that is not covered in this thread... Please post it in the main forum either as a new question or a continuation of an existing one.

Thanks!