Icf2020 programming

[n1das]

My story is similar to N1DAS's.

I have an IC-F1020 that has been perking along as the RF portion of my APRS digipeater for several years now.

I figured out many years ago that the level shifter in the programming cable was pretty simple and the same as what Vertex used for their handhelds. I had a bunch of Vertex VX-10s at the time so I had the programming cable. I made up an adapter to go from the 1/8 phone jack that the VX-10s uses to the RJ-45 that the F1020 uses.

I also have an old IBM laptop that runs Windows XP and has a real serial port. The programming software, Icom part number CS-F1020, I think, is a DOS program so I get that old XP laptop into DOS mode and run the software from a 3 1/2 inch floppy drive of all things.

It's a kludged solution, but it works.

Yes, your radio can be programmed. But, it's going to get harder and harder to do so.

IIRC the (ancient) software for the F1020 (VHF) and F2020 (UHF) is CS-F1000. I haven't used it since around 2011.

FWIW I looked up the FCC type acceptance on the F2020 out of curiosity when I put it into my 440 repeater back in 2011. It's an old radio and older than I thought. It was type accepted around 1998. I got my F2020 around 2001-2002. Since all of my newer radios all have digital capability, I have no use for the F2020 mobile other than to use it as the transmitter in an analog ham or GMRS repeater. All commercial radio gear purchased in the future shall have digital capabilities (DMR, P25, or NXDN).

The FCC's recent changes to Part 95 services (finally!) gave some closure regarding the future of GMRS as a licensed service. Given that GMRS is remaining a licensed service and I'm already GMRS licensed, I'm planning to re-purpose the home brewed 440 ham repeater as a portable GMRS repeater. The home brewed analog ham repeater will get replaced with a Hytera RD982U-1 DMR repeater.

 

[Jigglehurts]

I seen an icom pdf brochure of a repeater setup using either 1020 or 2020 transievers, had/has its own software too.
The icf2020 that I have is very clean opened it up and looks good in there too, supposedly NIB.
Got my desktop cleaned up but it was just beeping at me when I booted it up.played around and figured it out. booted into XP pro multiple times restarting it to test it looked good.set up a little bit of PC space for programming in the garage. Went to the store without turning it off and came back to it dead. SOOL.

Next I'll try my laptop with a pcmcia serial card adapter and see if it works since it might be cheaper than buying or building new desktop.
Still waiting for a certain company to ship out the set of programming cables for it, it's already been two weeks and they got paid for them from the looks of my bank. Thanks for the responses and knowledge.