For those Hams living in the Treasure Valley, Idaho, the Cinnabar repeater is back up with a new cabinet and all new internals. Kudos to the VOI Technical Committee for all their hard work and time invested in getting ’24 back in commision in style!

I had to scramble this weekend to find the manuals to my radios so that I could get them all set up with CTCSS as the new repeater requires it. I eventually got them located and programed, so I’m good to talk on it.

For those of you who are not Hams, a repeater is a duel radio configuration that sits atop a tall mountain and replays signals transmitted to it in order to extend their reach. The 147.24 repeater was taken out by lightening strike back in the Spring and the Voice Of Idaho Amateur Radio Club has footed the bill to replace it and update it for all Hams in the valley to enjoy. This weekend I heard contacts from McCall to Twin Falls on the new repeater so it’s back and back with a greater reach than before.

I have updated the link that pointed to the old Geek Garage site to the New Geek Garage Site from the VOI’s website!!! It is getting hit once in a while.

Get your new Geek Garage T-Shirt!

We put a new logo on the budget t-shirt and the mug.  If you join us on the radio net, you NEED the Geek Garage T-shirt!

Geek Garage Cafe Press

Celebrate 100 years of voice over radio, bring a friend into Amateur Radio.

The ARRL is celebrating the centenial of the first voice communication over radio waves with the “Hello…” campaign to get the word out about Amateur Radio. You can find lots of interesting trivia and information on becomming a Ham at the Hello-Radio.org web site.

Local testing days for Treasure Valley, Idaho.

Please bring two forms of ID including one picture ID and the cost of the test, which is $14. If you pay by check please make the check out to the “ARRL”.

– Amateur license testing session, first Saturday of each month at Radio Shack on Overland. The starting time is 9:00 am local time until about 11:00 am. This testing session sponsored by the Voice of Idaho Amateur Radio Club.

– Amateur license testing session, in Nampa at the fire training academy on the third Saturday of each month.

– Amateur license testing session, in Fruitland at the phone company building on the fourth Saturday of each month.