Lscott
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Posts posted by Lscott
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Did you try setting the backward compatibility in Windows 10?
I'm not sure about the software he has but I've run across some that still use 16 bit installers. Those don't work on Win 10 at all. Setting the compatibility mode is useless. The solution he used is a good one, running Win XP in a VM.
You can get a Win XP VM in Win 10 but you have to pay for the much more expensive Pro version to get the VM subsystem, "Hyper-V".
VirtualBox does about the same thing for zero cost. However you're left with finding a copy of the Win XP on your own.
Virtual Box is a good opensource VM package. I've even run Windows 3.1 in it. Even managed to find a copy of IBM's OS2 Warp 4 and got that to install and run too. If IBM and Microsoft had their act together we would all be running OS2 instead of Windows.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OS/2
Remember "Windows is a pane in the glass".
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I know to get accurate numbers its difficult. So I won't be doing any soon. As long as the antenna is equal to or greater then a dummy load I am good.
I should say I don't mind as much since most hts can handle the higher swr.
It's still would be an interesting experiment. Stories surface about counterfeit antennas from at least one well known manufacture are out there. I think it is Nagoya. Antenna testing showed the difference between the real one and the fake.
https://www.eham.net/reviews/view-product?id=7741
On another point I have purchased a few "cheap" magnet mount antennas mostly to get the mount from Ham Radio flea market vendors. After testing them the performance was nowhere close to the spec's on the package.
Some antenna testing results.
http://www.km4fmk.com/AntTesting.html
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You may find this book of interest. The book is about antennas and transmission lines. I hope Firefox didn't mangle this link again.
http://www.w3pga.org/Antenna Books/Reflections III.pdf
It's a good reference to keep on hand.
If the link above doesn't work, you have to copy the whole line and past it into the browser. Then try this one.
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You may find this book of interest. The book is about antennas and transmission lines. I hope Firefox didn't mangle this link again.
http://www.w3pga.org/Antenna Books/Reflections III.pdf
It's a good reference to keep on hand.
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Here is a little review. Since I got the Nano VNA f I decided to test an antenna that I have had for a while. I had bought 2 for a road trip. Btech sells them for $29. They are a lot cheaper then buying a magnet NMO and nmo antenna. I have been happy with the 2m (144mhz) performance, It has ok performance with GMRS and I feel it has been meh with 70cm (444mhz) performance. So I wanted to see what the numbers were like as far as SWR. I have been mostly using it for repeater usage on 2M and GMRS. No luck on 2m simplex, FRS/GMRS works well for simplex when in range. Furthest GMRS repeater has been to Alexandria give or take 11 miles from the truck. The same antenna, is being tested on a cookie backing pan in my dining room connected to an FT991a. I have managed to connect to 2m Frederick MD repeaters which are 27+ miles away on 5 watts. Still can't make a simplex call 5 miles with the same setup running 30 watts.
The stats from BTech 's website:
https://baofengtech.com/NAGOYA-UT-72
- Frequency Range: 136-174MHz, 400-520MHz; Optimal Frequency Range: 140-170MHz, 420-470MHz
- Wave: 1/4λ (144MHz) - 5/8λ (430MHz)
- Gain: 3.5dBi
- Max power: 80 Watts
- VSWR : Less 1.5:1
- Impedance: 50 OHM
- Connector: SMA-F & PL-259
- Length: 20 inches
So the VNA is showing the following.
144.562 National 2m SWR 2.53 :1
144.000 MHz SWR 2.89:1
147.999 MHz SWR 2.21:1
159.300-163.500 lowest SWR of 1.18:1
420.000 SWR 1.92:1
450.000 SWR 1.33:1
444.900-445.800 lowest of SWR of 1.3:1
FRS/GMRS Frequencies
462.5625 SWR 1.35:1
467.7250 SWR 1.40
SWR was 1.35-1.38:1 for most of the FRS/GMRS band.
Lowest actually was at 1.27:1 at 464.575 - 465.763 MHZ well outside of Amateur radio and FRS/GMRS service allocations.
You want to really have some fun try testing some HT antennas! They're not easy since the radio, and part of your body, ends up as part of the antenna. When you see the results you'll wonder why they work at all. A few I've tested belong in a landfill somewhere.
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As to what is appropriate, expected, or a FCC rule, the point of having the radio is communication, not complying to a rule. Sure, if you are an adult trying to talk to a stranger 100 miles away, by all means use your expected call sign. When it is my grand children, that is the least of my concern
As the license holder of record you're responsible to insure those operating under it follow the rules. Kids have to learn rules for everything as they grow up. GMRS shouldn't be any different.
As far as paying a fine the FCC, when they issue one, they don't screw around. Somehow getting one for $7,500 to $10,000 is sort of scary. They want to get your attention and make a point. And yes they most certainly have in other radio services for failure to ID, unlicensed operation, willful interference etc. I don't know about GMRS but it wouldn't be any different.
A number of the cases I've seen the FCC contacted the party informing them of the rule violation(s) first. The fine(s) get issued when they party continues to ignore the rules and the FCC notices. Oh, they also have a habit of taking the equipment too in some cases along with issuing the fine(s).
I remember years ago asking somebody at the local FCC field office here what they do with all of the confiscated equipment. I was told it goes to a local junk yard straight into the crusher. None of it ever gets sold or returned to the owner.
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The URL you posted was mangled. The correct page is here.
Thanks. Sometimes the copy and past with Firefox doesn't work so good.
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FCC
in Guest Forum
A few errors here.
- GMRS regulations were updated in 2017 and are now Part 95 Subpart E
- The full text of Part95E is available here.
- To be legal on GMRS, radios must have been type accepted or certified for: Part-95, Part-95A or Part-95E
- The icom IC-F6021 is Part-90 certified, but not certified for GMRS. However, it will operate on GMRS frequencies.
There have been several discussions about using Part-90 radios, and other "ham" or Part-15 certified radios on GMRS. Many people do this, many don't Search through the threads and you can read the various opinions.
Oops. Linked the wrong version or Part 95 rules.
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FCC
in Guest Forum
To be strictly legal the equipment must be Part 95 certified. Older equipment might be listed as Part 95 while newer equipment would be Part 95A.
This should be a good reference for Part 95. It covers several of the radio services, specially GMRS, FRS and CB.
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CFR-2009-title47-vol5/pdf/CFR-2009-title47-vol5-part95.pdf
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To have DMR would be nice, but narrowbanding GMRS will not open new channels for digital. They are already in use by FRS analog.
Alex, unfortunately you're right. 8-( I didn't look carefully at the exact channel layout for both services. The combining of main channels with interstitial ones screwed me up. I found a document on line that shows in a nice graphical format how the two services frequencies relate to each other.
Scroll down to last page and it is obvious what is going on.
https://apps.fcc.gov/kdb/GetAttachment.html?id=biZxuanIfZOUqdjvLHdsyw%3
D%3D&desc=888861 D01 Part 95 GMRS FRS v01&tracking_number=239603
So as you pointed out the spectrum does look full.
What is interesting are the GMRS interstitial channels sandwiched between the main GMRS channels. Its bad enough the low power FRS channels can cause interference on the main GMRS channels now we have the potential of higher power GMRS main channels partially overlapping the Interstitial GMRS channels. Then there is the potential interference of the Interstitial FRS and GMRS channels 8 through 14 with repeater input channels. The requirement that GMRS and FRS must be NB with a max of 0.5 watts is obviously to minimize interference on the GMRS WB repeater inputs frequencies. This is a mess.
The interference issues could be mitigated by moving GMRS to NB. That would at least eliminate the multiple channels overlapping due to differences in bandwidth.
Since the spectrum is full my idea of of going NB to get extra channels is not going to work in the existing allocated spectrum. Its very unlikely but the FCC could allocate a few new channels specifically for DMR use.
As far as allowing DMR within the existing spectrum, well somebody will have to tolerate mix mode operation on one or more channels. Allowing DMR repeaters on several of the channels maybe worth thinking about. You get effectively two voice channels on one frequency pair. There is a lot of experience and knowledge on how to do DMR repeater linking from the Ham bands which could be applied to GMRS.
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There would be one benefit to moving to NB operation for GMRS. Additional channels would be available in the same spectrum band. Some claim the service is under utilized now so extra channels wouldn't be needed. However the point to consider are the frequent questions I see posted about running DMR radios in the GMRS service. With newer NB channels the old ones would continue to be analog only while the newer ones would be reserved for DMR operation. This was done basically in the European PMR446 service with Digital PMR446. Originally it was analog only now they allow digital operation. DMR tier 2 uses a NB channel width of 12.5 KHz.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PMR446
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_mobile_radio
https://dpmrassociation.org/dPMR-a-brief-overview.html
DMR uses TDMA, two time slots, thus two digital voice channels would occupy one NB channel effectively doubling the number of users.
The mess with FRS radios can be mitigated with this change also by restricting FRS radios to the currently assigned analog channels. Licensed GMRS users and DMR enabled GMRS radios would have access to both, analog and digital, channels. With some firmware updates existing radios could easily be made available at an affordable price. Some have mention the Anytone analog/DMR radios, D878UV for example, and with a firmware change would likely work just fine.
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Changing GMRS from wide to narrow band would be an easy way to get rid of GMRS completely.
The elimination of wide band radios and repeaters would leave most serious GMRS users discouraged with the thought of replacing their equipment.
The FCC could use the argument that as both FRS & GMRS share frequencies they should both use the same band width.
I wouldn't say changing from WB to NB is an easy way to get rid of GMRS. The real question is just how many people are running NB now and don't even know it? I see frequent questions about Midland equipment which seems to be NB only. Apparently they sell enough of them. If the FCC switched to NB those users wouldn't notice and most likely wouldn't care since their radios would continue to work reasonably well after the switch.
The question of how it would impact repeater owners and users all depends on what equipment they use. If the repeater owner used old Part 90 radios that have both WB and NB capability the switch wouldn't be all that big of a deal. Same for ordinary users. In my particular case most of the HT's I have include both WB and NB functionality. All I need to do is fire up the computer, dig out the programming cables, read the codes plugs, switch bandwidth and then writing them back. Done. A bit of work but not a show stopper. Most of my radios already have dual sets of memories programmed, one for WB and another for NB. Yes it's a pain to flip from one to another depending on bandwidth but I can do it when necessary.
Your last point is an excellent one. Sooner or later the FCC is likely to address this with another rule change "tweak". Expecting FRS radios to disappear to solve the problem isn't realistic. There are far too many of them. Perhaps as a group we could start a move towards NB operation for those that have the equipment. After a period of time, with enough GMRS users have switched, any potential forced switch by the FCC won't be so painful.
Also a suggestion by others changing the rules to make GMRS the primary service and FRS secondary likely will fail too. People purchased the old combo FRS/GMRS radios, never read the instructions advising the necessity of getting a GMRS license, or just didn't care and used all the channels anyway. Expecting those kinds of people to respect, understand or yield the frequency to the primary user will result in about the same compliance experience, little to none.
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A bit off topic. I have a growing collection of hand-held radios, mostly Kenwood VHF and UHF commercial models, and the antennas are getting harder to identify as to band and frequency spilt. Most have no identification on them for the frequencies.
The VHF antennas seem to be “fatter” than the UHF ones. However there are different frequency ranges in each band. Seems like Kenwood uses a color coded gasket around the connector to denote the frequency range. I found the site below that has a lot of the antenna models with the band spilt identified by color.
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but I think certainly GMRS will work. We haven't even bought devices, yet.
I forgot to point out the currently sold FRS radios are allowed to run up to 2 watts where most GMRS only radios can do 4 to 5 watts. From a practical point of view there will be a small difference between a hand-held FRS radio verses a GMRS radio. Its likely your kids will be using an FRS radio in place of a GMRS radio. FRS radios don't require a license to operate and thus an "easier sell" to the other parents in the area.
The main advantage to GMRS radios are a bit more power, detachable antennas and repeater access. I'm not sure it would be a good idea for a group of young kids to tie up a repeater unless it's supervised. Remember repeaters do have a wide coverage area. I don't think people 10 to 15 miles away will want to hear the kids babbling away for hours. The detachable antennas would be nice if you wanted to setup a base station.
If you get the Midland GMRS radios they seem to be narrow banded only and thus are compatible with FRS radios.
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My sons are 4 and 6. The older one is in kindergarten, and all the schools and parks are closed for COVID-19. They're at home all day, every day. We ride bikes and whatnot, but it's not the same as going to school and hanging with friends. I'm not paying for a phone for a 6 year old. So, why not get a few families in the neighborhood to get a GMRS license so all the kids can talk to one another any time they want? They're not close enough for FRS, but I think certainly GMRS will work. We haven't even bought devices, yet. I genuinely want to know if this is a bad idea before we move forward. To me, it seems like a great way to take advantage of the current "STAY HOME" situation to get kids interested in communications.
Will other GMRS users be pissed off by a bunch of kids talking to each other all day? I plan to lock all their devices on a specific frequency, so they can't annoy anyone. How do we find a semi-private frequency no one is likely to use? If we need to use a local repeater to get across a hill, is it ok to ask, or would we get laughed at, or is it too big of an ask since they'll probably talk to each other way more than adults?
We live in a small town in Alabama, about 6,500 population, all within 2 miles, and situated in a valley between mountains. One subdivision is over a hill, but the whole rest of town is probably in line-of-sight.
Thanks for any advice.
This is EXACTLY what GMRS is for, family comm's and with other users. I would say go for it. Your point about locking the radios to a specific channel is also an excellent idea.
One it keeps the kids from messing up the channel settings and not understand why they can't talk to their friends. They WILL play with the radio buttons.
Second as you pointed out it also keeps them from skipping around the channels like an electronic form of hide and seek annoying the crap out of other users. I have a family near by me that does this. I never know what channel they will pop up on and sometimes change while playing radio.
Third you do want to make sure they don't end up on a repeater output channel. Young kids will just hit the PTT button and babble away even if the channel is in use. You can't expect kids that young to understand channel sharing. Even a low power FRS radio can wipe out the signal from a repeater if the FRS radio is close enough to another user's radio engaged in a repeater comm. FRS radios unfortunately are allowed on repeater output channels 15 through 22.
Forth it keeps the kids from getting "glued" to the computer screen.
Finally if the radio gets damaged or lost, young kids have a tendency to do both, it's likely cheaper to replace than a smart phone.
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You have some good points marcspaz.
About it being market driven, wide band verses narrow band, could get a boost by the manufactures. If they are already narrow band compliant it would be a marketing incentive for them to point it out to customers. Second any wide band equipment only, mostly used, would be eliminated from the market. Now users are pushed into buying more from the narrow band new equipment market and less from now smaller compliant used equipment market.
On the regulation front manufactures could point out to the FCC they have good sales of their narrow band radios and few requests for wide band equipment. The FCC could then infer the consumer has a preference for narrow band equipment, or at least don't find it a limiting factor in how they use their radios. Making a decision to go narrow band for GMRS would be an easy one I suspect for the FCC.
On the engineering side of things it's rather a screwy situation where you have two different radio services assigned the same spectrum but with different technical specifications for bandwidth. If the goal was really to allow the two to interoperate the FCC screwed it up. Having one station on frequency running wide band and another running narrow band results in some annoying messing around with the volume control. It's either to loud or too soft depending on who is doing the RX'ing and the TX'ing. By the way this happens with DMR when people don't get their audio levels set right. One minute i can hardly hear one station and the other station blows be out of the chair.
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I read from time to time proposals to switch GMRS from normal FM to narrow band FM, 2.5KHz deviation, and the arguments for and against it including repeater owners.
One of the questions that seems to get little attention is just how prevalent are narrow band FM capable radios out there that are in use? Any legitimate proposal to go narrow band has to address this question.
I use several that can do both normal FM and narrow band FM, primarily Kenwoods like the TK-370G, TK-3170, TK-3140 to mention a few.
The other point is how many of the current offerings from the likes of Midland, Btech and others that can do both or just narrow band like Midland that gets often mentioned?
The point I want to get to is if the majority of radios currently, or at some point in the future, are just narrow band, because that's what people buy whether they know it or not, could be the tipping point where the FCC says GMRS is going narrow band. If most radios at that point are narrow band the disruption for the majority of users would be small so the FCC isn't going to worry so much about the small number of wide band radios out there.
The FCC sort of did this with the combo FRS/GMRS radios where almost nobody was getting a license to use the GMRS channels. So they just changed the rules to reflect how the radios were really getting used. They didn't seem to worry much how this impacted GMRS users at the time.
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Hello!
My name is Dan and I'm in Palm Desert, CA. I just recently got my GMRS license and I'm studying up for my Technician License (fingers crossed they'll start testing again soon!!).
Good luck taking the Tech Class license exam when they start testing again. Welcome to the group. GMRS is a lot of fun.
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There are no legal GMRS radios on the market if they have 22 channels. Why?
Channel 8-14 are dedicated FRS channels and transmit power on those channels is .5 watts.
Only blister packs meet the power with fixed antenna.
But the blister packs are illegal if they transmit on channels above 14
Baofeng radios like the UV5R
And 888s are legal to transmit on GMRS
But if a GMRS users transmission 8-14 they are breaking the stupid rules because those radios transmit on low at 1 watt and dont have fixed antennas.
The same with all Amateur radio equipment.
The FCC has made mess by keeping FRS.
Too many illegal users
GMRS has the potential to be a great secondary communication network for people that dont have reliable Cell coverage.
The FCC when they approve a cell tower and a cell provider a license, require them to install and maintain a GMRS repeater.
That makes it possible for nation wide radio communications with even a 5 watt radio.
The .5 fixed antenna users can pay a $5 GMRS annual fee. No repeater use
End the FRS frequencies.
The rules were changed in 2017 and became effective in 2018 for all of the Part 95 services. All previous combo FRS/GMRS radios are now classified as FRS radios.
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2017-08-29/pdf/2017-17395.pdf
This site has a good summary of the new frequency and power limits.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Mobile_Radio_Service
The Baofeng UV5R, and variants, don't have the required Part 95 certification from the FCC and thus are technically illegal to use for GMRS. However people use them as such since they're cheap. Is the FCC busting people for using them? Maybe not, but you are playing a game of twisting the dragon's tail so if you get flamed you had fair warning.
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For a battery... a small 12.5v lithium ion or gel cell should be fine. they are between 50%-60% lighter than lead acid batteries. The lighter the better.
I would second that suggestion, Lithium battery. Specifically I would recommend a LiFePO4, LFP, battery. They have the safest chemistry out of the common Lithium battery types, light and reasonably high energy density. One other advantage to LFP batteries is the terminal voltage. At full charge they are around 13.3 or so VDC, a very good match to most mobile equipment that expects 13.8 VDC. The battery has a very flat voltage verses discharge curve so when the terminal voltage drops to 12.8 VDC the battery is almost completely discharged, like around 80 to 90 percent of the rated capacity is used. Don't try this with a lead acid battery.
I've also found they have a very low self discharge rate. You can charge them up and let them sit for months and the terminal voltage hardly drops. For an Ecom application this would be an advantage.
I've wreck enough Gel-Cell lead-acid batteries over the years I won't buy them anymore if the equipment can use the LFP type. Lead acid batteries don't like sitting around unless they have a trickle charger attached and don't let them sit around at less than full change, they will sulfate the plates. Neither of these conditions hurt LFP batteries. As a matter of fact one recommendation for long term storage of LFP batteries is to discharge them to around 50-80 percent of capacity, they can stay that way for months to a year or more this way without damage.
While LFP batteries are much more expensive than the common lead acid type once you ruin a few lead acid batteries you'll get sick of replacing them and the cost adds up.
I've had good luck with the following company for LFP batteries.
https://www.bioennopower.com/collections/12v-series-lifepo4-batteries
If you want to use a solar panel to recharge the battery a small MPPT controller designed specifically for LFP batteries is required. I have several from this company.
https://sunforgellc.com/genasun/
I have a couple of the GV5 charge controllers, a good match for a 50 watt solar panel.
For solar panels I got some from this company.
https://www.renogy.com/products/solar-panels/
I have a couple of their 50 watt mono and 1 of their 30 watt mono panels. The build quality is good and they do guarantee them.
On solar panels from my experience don't expect to get more than around 70 to 75 percent of the panel rating, which is derived under lab conditions, which you won't get in the field.
- marcspaz, WRJQ238 and jonnylocks
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Or maybe more basically, will the roughly 1 dB of signal loss, due to the 35 more ft of antenna cable, negatively affect the signal range more than getting the getting the antenna 4-5 ft higher above the ground?Plugging in the height numbers into this online calculator:
http://www.hamuniverse.com/lineofsightcalculator.html
shows the difference in range is around 0.5 miles, distance to the horizon, more at the higher elevation. If you were located in an area that was flat its not much of a change. However you're in a bit of a depression so anything you can do to get the antenna higher will be beneficial and a reasonable trade off for a bit more coax loss. At some point you'll likely go for an antenna with some gain which will make up for the extra 1db of coax loss.
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If you cannot, or really do not want to, drill a mounting hole in your truck,
I would think very carefully about doing this. Besides going to aluminum to save weight the sheet metal gauge is likely reduced too. With an NMO mount there isn't that much metal area to resist the bending moment of the antenna. I've read more than one account where the roof was damaged, roof area bent or the mount just plain ripped out, when the antenna hit a small tree branch or driving at highway speeds. At least with a magnet mount it will just knock it off the roof most likely with little to no damaged being caused.
If you do go with a NMO mount research first for a good way to reinforce the roof are around it before doing the install.
Many mobile antennas are fairly stiff and don't give much if they are flexed so an antenna strike goes straight to the mount. Some antennas are available with a spring located at the antenna base. These will reduce the chance your vehicle roof and or antenna will suffer damage from a low tree branch strike or other low obstruction contact.
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Asking for a friend, actually a guy on an ATV forum who's installed a dual band UHF/VHF 25 watt radio.
How close is too close to the head for an antenna? I'm sure it depends on how often and how long signals are transmitted but from the looks of his photo the antenna and ball will be within a foot of the back of his head.
I don't wanna be 'that guy' and bark at him but considering a suggestion. Thought maybe you guys would have something for me.
I checked FCC and it's pretty vague, or at best hard to get down to the numbers.
Thanks.,
You want to look at something like the following:
https://transition.fcc.gov/bureaus/oet/info/documents/bulletins/oet65/oet65b.pdf
https://www.osha.gov/SLTC/radiofrequencyradiation/evaluation.html
Finally get the M1225 Programming Software running under Win10 64bit
in Equipment Reviews
Posted
I hope at some point these guys will get to the beta phase of development then it might be stable enough to do something with it. I've been watching this project for a while. It's an open source clone of MS Windows.
https://reactos.org