Morse Code

Morse Code Morse code to WAV, MP3 and Ogg cw, morse code, amateur radio, mp3, wav, ogg, audio, practice, perl, ky8d Gan Uesli Starling 2006-2024, Gan Uesli Starling KY8D’s Morse Code Page

Study is far less fatiguing when you can break up each day’s effort into a number of short stints. Not so easy, that breaking up, when it ties you to a computer. Here’s my solution: archives of *.mp3 files for loading into a portable player or smartphone. Whole novels rendered into Morse code. In each, the speed very slowly increases. Plural languages offered: English, Esperanto, German, Italian, and Spanish. Those plus also the software I coded for to generating the MP3 files. All free, no strings= attached.

May I suggest using this smartphone app: Smart Audiobook Player available on Google Play. That app has many features. You can even change playback speed without affecting the tone. There is even a sleep timer.

English Starting From Scratch

Here are MP3 files of character practice groups. Download buttons without fraction bars show the WPM range, normally spaced. Those with fraction bars show the range of Farnsworth (Ref. ARRL) spacing followed by character speed. Hover the mouse curser over any download button for a pop-up listing further details.

Download: Archives of sequential *.mp3 files

Koch Intro First CW for beginners. (Greatly expanded 2024-05-12)
04-20/20 Farnsworth jumble-word drills.
10-20/20 500 common words plus prosigns, Q-signals, etc.
12-20 Punctuation and prosign code groups.
12-20 FCC commercial 'T' License code groups. (Ref. Class T)

Building Speed

Consider the term muscle memory. A misleading name, since it occurs not in the muscles at all, but wholly inside the brain. The more general term is procedural memory, where any sufficiently oft-repeated decision becomes encoded as long-term memory in the subconscious instead. Thereby is one’s conscious mind relieved from the burden of micro-managing many an otherwise tediously routine task.

Herein lies your ultimate goal: to leave off having to think about Morse code at all. So that upon hearing the sound of dit dah your concious mind pays scant if any attention while upon that same instant the letter A is supplied by the subconscious.

How do we get there? The same as how we might instead learn to juggle or touch type. Taking the first as our example, our earliest efforts are very clumbsy. Why? Because the conscious mind is trying to manage every smallest aspect of the activity. Slowly, after a great many repetitions, those decisions get coded into the subconscious, leaving the conscious only a supervisory role.

With regard to Morse code, two training methods exist to capitalize on this. First there is Koch, and secondly Farnsworth. Koch introduces characters one at a time. You drill on just only one letter until it becomes subconscious. Only then do you take on another. Koch thereby unburdens the conscious mind for having to work a look-up table of many parts. You instead build your mental lookup table one element at a time. Outside of a structured classroom environment, few have the patience for this. That said, I myself am returning to Koch for touch-typing hard-copy practice.

Farnsworth spacing purposely frustrates the conscious counting of dits and dahs. With charcters sent too fast to count, Farnsworth coaxes mental attendance upon characters as a whole (upon their rhythm). Farnsworth thereby brings hearing a letter closer to seeing that letter in print. How so? In print you see the whole letter at once. You do not receive its individucal strokes and curves sequentially. Being as how in Morse a letter is presented in parts over time, the shorter that duration of time the more it approximates hearing the whole letter at once.

Farnsworth is therefor a must to rank beginners and post-QRT speed-builders alike. Above I present both Farnsworth and Koch combined in a most helpful way. Below you will find both Farnsworth and normal spacing presented in a wide range of speeds, hopefully thus to suit everyone’s particular needs.

Allow me to offer one further bit of guidance, gained from my own experience. While listening, firmly suppress any temptation to ever once guess ahead. Neither while still awaiting full completion of the current word, and especially not while any character has yet to finish. Too often you will guess wrong. That makes for a stumble such that you miss several following words. Besides which, guessing ahead is conscious effort, and so to be avoided even should you guess right. Develop instead the skill of patient aural observation. This last is the very hardest part. It is a very particular skill which by itself takes long practice to hone.

What you’ll be seeking to achieve is a meditative frame of mind. Which is to say an alert but relaxed mode of non-interactive observation. One where you do not strive at comprehension. Strenuous effort in this regard only serves to exhaust mental resources. Such excess of zeal hinders progress instead.

Lastly, vary your study as much as need be, so long as never a whole day goes by. Some time must be spent each and every day. That no matter what. If nothing else, listen for a few minutes while waiting to fall alseep. And again in the morning before rising up from bed. Repetition is the single and only key which prods the brain into laying down procedural memory tracks. Get to that point and the code itself will disappear, you’ll begin to hear (not ‘think’) letters in place of dits and dahs. Like so without any mental effort at translation. Everyone is able to do this. Were any not able, never could they add new words to their vocabulary. So then, like that.

Below I give you far less tedious practice toward enduring the necessary ad-infinitum repetitions of audio symbols: short stories and entire novels. The source text is included with each. Track the text by eye as you listen. Like that for starters. After a while, stop reading along and instead write down each character once you have heard it complete. Whenever convenient make hard copy, either by pencil or on a keyboard, thereby modeling yourself after the true professionals. After a longer period yet, simply listen, reading Morse code by ear.

Download: More *.zip archives of *.mp3 files.
Hover mouse over download button for play time in hours, etc.

Special Characters

Prosigns & Punctuation:

ITU Codes:
- –•–•– Starting Signal MP3 files all start thus.
- •–•–• End Transmission MP3 files all end thus.
- –•••– Line Separator Two in a row begins new paragraph.
- •–••–• (RR) Quote Mark Prose contains dialog!
- –––••• (OS) Colon Not many of these.
- –•–•–• (KR) Semicolon A few of these.
Non-ITU Codes:
- –•–•–– (KW) = ! (exclam) As proposed originally by Heathkit.
- ••––•– (UK) = _ (underscore) The Gutenberg Project uses underscores to delimit italics.

Farnsworth Spacing

MP3 audiobooks. Archives of MP3 files all having character speeds of 20 wpm with wide gaps between for a slower overall speed (Ref. ARRL). As each novel progresses, the inter-character gaps shorten by tiny increments (0.01 wpm). Thus does the overall speed increase so minutely as not to be noticed. On each download link, a dash separates initial-vs-final overall speeds. These being prose short stories and novels, expect to encounter full punctuation. If unwilling to learn certain marks (colon, semicolon, etc), accept those as trip-hazard practice. Simply ignore and continue. Speed progressions are deliberately slow. Feel free to skip ahead any time you feel yourself ready

05-08 “The Tree of Life” by C. L. Moore
05-09 “The Grisly Horror” by Robert E. Howard
06-08 “The Dream Snake” by Robert E. Howard
06-10 “The World that Couldn’t Be” by Clifford D. Simak
07-11 “Omnilingual” by H. Beam Piper
07-13 “Red Nails” by Robert E. Howard
08-12 “The Dunwich Horror” by H. P. Lovecraft
08-14 “A Plague of Pythons” by Frederick Pohl
09-14 “Voodoo Planet” by Andre Norton
09-16 “An Earthman on Venus” by Ralph Milne Farley
10-16 “The Ultimate Weapon” by John W. Campbell
10-20 “The Radio Planet” by Ralph Milne Farley
11-23 “John Silence, Physician Extraordinary” by Algernon Blackwood
11-19 “The Mysterious Ninth World” by Donald Allen Wollheim
12-19 “A Princess of Mars” by Edgar Rice Burroughs
12-20 “The Lair of the White Worm” by Brahm Stoker
13-20 “The Secret Garden” by Frances Hodgson Burnett
13-19 “Scaramouche” by Rafael Sabatini
14-22 “The Scarlet Pimpernel” by Baroness Orczy
14-22 “The Green Odyssey” by Phillip Jose Farmer
15-21 “Deathworld” by Harry Harrison
15-23 “Plague Ship” by Andre Norton
16-22 “White Fang” by Jack London
16-24 “Mars is My Destination” by Frank Belknap Long
17-24 “Little Fuzzy” by H. Beam Piper
17-27 “Life on the Mississippi” by Mark Twain
18-26 “The Cosmic Computer” by H. Beam Piper
18-25 “A Gentleman’s Handbook on Eiquette and Manual of Politeness” by Cecil B. Hartley
19-26 “Tarzan of the Apes” by Edgar Rice Burroughs
19-27 “Around the World in 80 Days” by Jules Verne

Important Note: Above a certain threshold speed (somewhere in the vicinity of 20 wpm) only normal ITU-standard spacing ought be employed. A speed where Farnsworth timing is abandoned. There’s nothing precisely official about where to set that threshold. The ARRL does so at 18 wpm ... as you will hear in ARRL CW practice broadcasts (Ref. ARRL). A group called CW-Ops sets it instead way up at 25 wpm ... as heard in their own CW exercises. CW-Ops goes with 25 on account of formerly admitting none to their ranks as had not been vetted by three existing members attesting to having a QSO with you at 25 wpm or higher. I myself feel that Farnsworth timing ought best to cease at least by 20 wpm, thus to align with the FCC’s Class T maritime commercial license exam (Ref. Class T). Yes! Just so... Imagine yourself at the key of an historic 500 kHz transmitter, say that of KKUI aboard the SS American Victory at the Port of Tampa, communicating on 12 MHz with KPH at Pointe Reyes, CA. Or the same thing in reverse. Now imagine failing that exam because of non-familiarity with normal spacing exacerbating exam-time nervous jitters! Therefor do audiobooks downloaded from here, upon crossing the 20 wpm threshold leave Farnsworth behind, increasing character speed instead.

Normal CW Spacing

10-60 FYI: Proof of the pudding. A set of timing test runs: “PARIS ” repeated 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, and 60 times, each test run giving an exact 1-minute file.

Audiobooks of normally spaced CW. These being prose novels, expect to encounter full punctuation. If reluctant to study infrequent codes (colon, semicolon, etc), accept their inclusion as trip-hazard practice. Simply ignore and continue. Per-file speed increments are deliberately miniscule. Skip ahead anytime you feel ready.

Important Note: At rates below 13 wpm the brain tallies each dit and dah separately. From 13 wpm up to around 20 wpm the brain still tallies dits and dahs, just with higher efficiency via a now well-memorized lookup table. Not until 20 wpm or thereabouts does the brain apprehend character rhythm instead, beyond which point letters are heard rather than sets of dits and dahs. Hence the FCCs original requirements of 13 wpm for a General class license, and 20 wpm for Amateur Extra. Thus does Farnsworth spacing promote recognition of character rhythms right from day one, such that the archive sets above (as opposed to those below) are instead your best and fastest route to reading Morse code by ear. That said, no one transmits Farnsworth spacing over the air. Hence my also including QRS audio archives among those provided below. Therein lay timing examples to follow while sending at QRS speeds.

06-13 “At the Mountains of Madness” by H. P. Lovecraft
07-13 “Heart of Darkness” by Joseph Conrad
08-14 “The Thirty-Nine Steps” by John Buchan
09-15 “The Planet of Shame” by Bruce Elliott
10-16 “The Pricess and the Goblin” by George MacDonald
11-16 “The Island of Doctor Moreau” by H. G. Wells
12-18 “The Man Who Was Thursday” by G. K. Chesterton
13-20 “Three Men in a Boat” by Jerome K. Gerome
14-20 “Gullivers Travells” by Jonathan Swift, D.D.
15-20 “War of the Worlds” by H. G. Wells
16-21 “Star Born” by Andre Norton
17-24 “Moby Dick” by Herman Melville
18-23 “20,000 Leagues Under the Seas” by Jules Verne
19-24 “Dracula” by Bram Stoker
20-25 “Frankenstein” by Mary Wollstonecraft (Godwin) Shelley
21-26 “The Night Land” by William Hope Hodgson
22-26 “The King in Yellow” by Robert W. Chambers
23-27 “The Lost World” by Edgar Rice Burroughs
24-28 “The Hour of the Dragon” by Robert E. Howard
25-30 “The Moon Pool” by A. Merritt
26-30 “A Journey to the Center of the Earth” by Jules Verne
27-31 “Five Weeks in a Balloon” by Jules Verne
28-31 “The Cosmic Computer” by H. Beam Piper
29-34 “Don Quixote, Vol 1” by Miguel de Cervantes
30-35 “Don Quixote, Vol 2” by Miguel de Cervantes
32-37 “The Metal Monster” by Abraham Merritt
36-41 “The Mysterious Island” by Jules Verne
37-40 “Deathworld” by Harry Harrison
38-42 “Plague Ship” by Andre Norton
40-43 “Captives of the Flame” by Samuel R Delany

Omnibus Archives

Archives containing plural, sequential works such that follow in order, one after the other, at minutely increasing speeds.

15-30 “Sherlock Holmes Omnibus” by Arthur Conan Doyle
20-30 “Arsène Lupin Omnibus” by Maurice LeBlanc
20-33 “The String of Pearls Omnibus”, aka "Sweeny Todd". A penny dreadful, author Unknown
25-36 “E. E. 'Doc' Smith Omnibus” Triplaneary & The Lensman Series

Viewer Requests

20-25 “Maritime Travels” by Gilbert R. Bossé, VE2BTT

Punctuation

As you may have already discovered, my MP3 archives present unexpurgated Morse code including full punctuation. Encountered most frequently are quotes (RR), appostrophe (.----.), semicolon (a period backwards), and colon (OS). The source texts are stories and novels, which, if stripped of punctuation are made difficult to follow. Lastly, there are underscores (UK), which the Gutenberg Project employs to delimit italics.

But why not, after all, learn Morse in its entirety? You then may enjoy to flaunt your complete mastery of Morse on the air. During a ragchew, name a book or movie title inside of quotes. Complain of your weekend honeydew list, introducing the sequence of chores with a colon. Separate a two-part sentence with the appropriate semicolon.

Lest any complain, let them firstly know this: I made these for me, and you get them free. Likewise freely, further down I share the tools wherewith they may create their very own study files. Said tool even offers, already built in, a means of excising any character whatsoever from all text that it encounters.

File Sources

All *.mp3 files in the archives above were created by feeding UTF-8 text into an audio file generator program: gus_morse.pl. This I hand coded myself, initially in 2006, subsequently improving upon it in 2015, 2018, 2022, and 2023. UTF-8 files for the word-jumble sets derive from a second companion program: gus_jumbled_words.pl. This I coded in 2015 and have not changed since. UTF-8 text for the punctuation drills was hand-coded. The stories and novels all derive from the Gutenberg Project, on-line. I very hope that these meet your needs.

However, should my choices not quite suit your fancy, or should my inclusion of punctuation prove in excess of your own narrower goals, two sections below I further share, equally freely, also the software by which I generated all files above. I coded these programs for me and you are welcome to use them for free. Please report any issues that you may have.

Viewer Requests

I will also entertain viewer requests. This provided the subject matter does not relate to either politics or religion. Source text must be in the public domain. It is a service for which you need pay me nothing at all. Contact me either via my email listed at bottom-of-page, or else by my email listed on QRZ.

Donations

From its inception in 2005 until my retirement in 2023 the cost of maintaining this site was most gladly born as my little way of giving back to the hobby. Now, however with Social Security alone to bolster my savings, the annual fees begin to pinch. And so, should anyone feel they’d like to pitch in, no matter how trivial the sum, that would be most welcome indeed. In which case, click on the fine feathered image below.

Deutsch

Hier sind die ZIP-Dateien der Morsecode-MP3-Dateien auf Deutsch. Die Download-Schaltflächen zeigen Geschwindigkeitsbereiche in Wörtern pro Minute vom Anfang bis zum Ende an. Beispiel: „20-25“ bedeutet, dass die erste Datei 20 Wörter pro Minute abspielt, die zweite Datei schneller usw., bis die letzte Datei 25 Wörter pro Minute abspielt.

Spezielle Codes: CH –––– (MM), ß •••––•• (SZ), Ü ••–– (UT), ! –•–•–– (KW), _ ••––•– (UK)

Romane

10-20 “Verfall einer Familie” von Thomas Mann
15-20 “Der Zauberberg” von Thomas Mann
20-25 “Der Untertan” von Heinrich Mann

Español

Aquí hay los archivos ZIP de archivos MP3 de código Morse en español. Los botones de descarga muestran los rangos de velocidad en palabras por minuto de principio a fin. Por ejemplo: "20-25" indica que el primer archivo reproduce 20 palabras por minuto, el segundo archivo más rápido y así sucesivamente hasta el archivo final a 25 palabras por minuto.

Códigos especiales: Ñ ––•–– (GM), ! –•–•–– (KW), _ ••––•– (UK)

Novelas

10-16 “Niebla” por Miguel De Unamuno
11-14 “La nariz de un notario” por Edmond About
12-15 “El sombrero de tres picos,” por Pedro Antonio de Alarcón
13-17 “De las Islas Filipinas,” por Don Luis Prudencio Alvarez y Tejero
14-19 “Cuentos de amor” por condesa de Emilia Pardo Bazán
15-20 “El Escuadrón del Brigante” por Pio Baroja
16-20 “El Señor y los demás son Cuentos” por Leopoldo Alas
18-23 “Cañas y barro” por Vicente Blasco Ibáñez
20-25 “Revista Maritima” por Gilbert R. Bossé, VE2BTT

Completos

15-26 “El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha” por Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Esperanto

Jen ZIP-arĥivoj de MP3-dosieroj por ke vi ekzercigu vin mem pri la Morsa kodo. Inkluditaj estas ankaŭ la tekstaj dosieroj. Elŝut-butonoj montras la vort-rapidecojn ekde komenco ĝis fino. Ezemple: "15-20" indikas, ke la unua dosiero sonas je 15 vortojn ĉiu-minute, kaj fina dosiero de tiu serio sonas je 20-vortan rapidecon. La tipa pliiĝo de rapideco estas po 0.02 vortoj/minuto en ĉiu sekva dosiero. Do elektu, mi konsilas, komenc-rapidecon unu vorton malpli ol via nacilingva lego-kapablo.

Specialaj kodoj: Ĉ –•–•• (CE), Ĝ –––•–• (GN), Ĥ –––– (MM), Ĵ •–––• (JE), Ŝ •••–• (SN), Ŭ ••–– (UT), ! –•–•–– (KW), _ ••––•– (UK)

Noveloj

13-18 “La Karavano” aŭtorita de Wilhelm Hauff
14-18 “Genius Loci” aŭtorita de Clark Ashton Smith
15-21 “Mazirien la Magiisto” aŭtorita de Jack Vance
16-17 “Retretejo Ulvarda” aŭtorita de Jack Vance
17-18 “La Urbo de la Kantanta Flamo” aŭtorita de Clark Ashton Smith
18-22 “Ĉe la Koro de la Tero” aŭtorita de Edgar Rice Burroughs
19-21 “Domo de l' Se” aŭtorita de Jack Vance
20-25 “Kugel la Ruza” aŭtorita de Jack Vance

Ligiloj

xml html html Facebook Esperanto-paĝoj.

Italiano

Ecco i file ZIP dei file MP3 in codice Morse in italiano. I pulsanti di download visualizzano gli intervalli di velocità in parole al minuto dall'inizio alla fine. Esempio: “20-25” significa che il primo file riproduce 20 parole al minuto, il secondo file riproduce più velocemente, ecc. finché l'ultimo file riproduce 25 parole al minuto.

Simboli speciali: É –•–•• (KI), ! –•–•–– (KW), _ ••––•– (UK)

Romanzi

08-10 “Vecchie Storie” scritto da Emilio De Marchi
10-12 “Amore bendato” scritto da Salvatore Farina
12-14 “Il Sacro Macello Di Valtellin” scritto da Cesare Cantù
14-16 “Nuove storie d'ogni color” scritto da Emilio De Marchi
16-18 “Senz'Amore” scritto da Marchesa Colombi
18-20 “Il fallo d'una donna onesta” scritto da Enrico Castelnuovo
20-22 “Cantoni il volontario” scritto da Giuseppe Garibaldi
22-24 “Ricordi di Parigi” scritto da Edmondo De Amicis
24-26 “Galatea” scritto da Anton Giulio Barrili
26-28 “Nana a Milano” scritto da Cletto Arrighi
28-30 “Abrakadabra” scritto da Antonio Ghislanzoni
30-32 “L'Innocente” scritto da Gabriele D'Annunzio

Accuracy Over Speed

The one-time professional CW operators copied everything down. Sparks aboard ships, telegraphers for Western Union, these all copied message traffic by typing onto a mill (a special, all-caps typewriter). At the US Navy school for radiomen, all sat down from day one before a mill. Reading by ear faster than one could type, while helpful, was never the primary goal.

1941 Underwood Universal Mill

Note that still to this day the FCC administers a commercial radiotelphone license for which you can test (as I have done). The Morse requirement is random code groups at 16 wpm and message traffic text at 20 wpm. Let accuracy over speed be your own as well.

I surmise that the slang term head copy can only have evolved from newly baked hams being unaware that the correct term is read. Reading code is done by ear, while copying code means to make a verbatim copy. Saying head copy therefor implies perfect recall. Find those distinctions clearly defined in professional training manuals both civilian and military. So then, read and copy. Plain and simple single-word terms. Those versus head copy and solid copy. Yes, it’s only a hobby. But even so... Each decade seems to narrow the difference between our amateur radio and “Get yer ears on, good buddy.” How nice it would be see even a small reversal in that trend. Correct use of terms seems to me the easiest thing.

Morse Code File Generator

Most other Morse code generator programs available on the Internet run on Java and play through the MIDI device of a sound card. Mine is different. It runs on Perl and works by reading instructions and/or plain text in from a *.txt file. On Linux and Windows both it can generate either *.wav or *.mp3 . Nearly all players can handle both formats.

On Unix/Linux/BSD/OS X

Download:

Perl POD Perl source code & documentation

Change file extension from *.pl.txt to *.pl. Adjust the path in the shebang line as apporpriate for your own distro. I have it set for Ubuntu Linux. Your’s might be different. You very likely already have Perl, but in addition need to acquire these two extra modules for Perl: Audio::Wav and Time:HiRes. Get those in the usuall way from CPAN, pkgsrc, or wherever. Read the POD to learn all the features. Also you'll want to be sure LAME is installed (unless you want only *.wav and not *.mp3 output).

On Windows

Download:

ZIP Perl source code, documentation, & *.exe versions

First, here’s the easy-peasy way. The ZIP archive contains two stand-alone 64-bit *.exe files: gus_jumble_words.exe and gus_morse.exe, which are simplified, one-click versions that ask questions rather than take their arguments on the command line. Now generates either *.wav or *.mp3 the same as when running on Linux. Source code in Perl is likewise included.

Practice Text Generator

Here is a Perl script to generate *.txt files for Morse code practice programs. Use it with my own audio file generator script above, or with any other. It creates a file of jumbled words taken at random from lists of more than 85,000. The word lists derive from an on-line dictionary for the word game Scrabble. Words containing high-score letters: Z, J, Q, and so forth. Lists for only that half of the whole alphabet. The not-so-rare letters turn up regardless. So then, more balanced practice.

And since Morse code is not just letters alone, the program stirs these into the mix: punctuation (1:5), number groups (1:7), reverse-spelled words (1:11), and random gobbledegook (1:19) to keep you alert. Those ratios are the default. You can override them with switches. Feed the resulting *.txt file into my gus_morse.pl script with an embedded, top-line instruction of...

*wpm=25**farn=13**lang=en**incr=0.0**decr=0.09**codec=mp3**about=0**mins=10*

...and you’ll get about one hundred 10-minute *.wav or *.mp3 files of 25-wpm characters with 13-wpm spacing to start and slowly increasing to about 22-wpm spacing. Takes quite a while for so many. If your PC is slow, leave it run overnight. Then put the whole lot into your MP3 player, turn off shuffle and listen to them sequentialy.

Note that the word-jumble algorithm is random. Re-run it again to generate a new file of mostly different words, jumbled differently. Don’t be surprised at any word which might turn up. Sailor-words are legal in Scrabble, so it would appear. Likewise the names of seldom-mentioned body parts. Only one of those words (and its derivatives) did I bother editing out from those lists.

Download:

Perl POD 1 2 3 4 5 Script, Doc & Sample Results 1-5

Smart Phones

I nowadays mostly listen to audiobooks on a Samsung Galaxy S20. The app I employ is named Smart Audiobook Player, installed by way of Google Play. It works for all manner of MP3 audiobooks in addition to playing my MP3 practice files. All, that is, save Audible, which files are encrypted and work only with the proprietary Audible app.

MP3 Players

I have owned several MP3 players, both cheapos and super nice. My program tailors audio files to work on both. My cheapest is a Sandisk Sansa Sport/Clip player, a tiny thing with an itsy bitsy screen. To support the Sansa I set the genre tag to ‘Audiobook’ per the Sandisk website instruction (even though it isn’t a proper ID3 tag). I likewise set the album tag. That is so the Sansa will group them. As of August 2018, the script now automatically groups files into sub-directories of the Sansa's 128-file maximum. Hopefully that is also good enough for other players.

My better player is Cowon iAudio 10. For audiobooks to work on that one I don’t have to do anything special. I mention it however because of a most useful feature. The Cowon lets me vary the playback speed while at the same time compensating for tone. Thus I can reduce or speed up a particular CW audio file while still retaining the 750 or 800 Hz that I’m used to hearing. So if it’s unavoidable to skip a day in my CW speed-gain practice, or if I’m tired or for whatever excuse, I don’t have to back up to an earlier file. I can keep going from where I left off. Handy when it’s a story downloaded from the Gutenberg project or cut-and-paste copied from out of an ebook. In fact, that feature is excellent too for listening to a regular narrated audiobook under conditions of noise or when my attention needs to be focused mainly elsewhere. Like when driving. Just thought I’d mention in case you were shopping.

One feature which the iAudio 10 regretably lacks (and is the main reason why I bought the Sansa) is an external hardware button for pasusing playback. Instead you have to activate and cue the menu. Very annoying when I need to pause in a hurry, like when restaurant wait staff has come to take my order.

Other CW Study Aids

If my system doesn’t suit your taste, here is a list of alternative providers. Maybe one of theirs you’ll like better.

Visit: SKCC LICW DJ1YFK DL2KCD AA9PW G4FON K5TR AH0A M0TRN W5BRB SMRCC

Contact

Links:

xml My ham radio webpage.
html My QRZ webpage.
html My personal webpage.
email Report any problems.