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It's very surprising how fast the interest in this has picked up in early 2024.

I've built 4 Heltec V3 units now... two for myself, two for a friend. Acquired a RAK, a T-Beam and an T-Echo as well. I've been having fun. :)

I wonder if that's the international sign for communication at 00:11. 😆 Yes, Meshtastic is getting HOT around here. Thanks for the video

I did, as anything. You got me into this, made me pass my general test. Your videos are great. Helpful, not stand offish, and you break it down for us non tech savvy folks.

just set up a couple. I figure I can make a radio, antenna, battery, solar panel and case for 50 bucks maybe. If I can get my neighbors interested I will build a few like this as repeaters and put them along the road and maybe use a few gpio pins on a few for driveway and gate sensors which I understand it can do but haven't seen anyone demo it yet. Could set a node up so a new person out here wants it just zap strap the whole package to a tree or post that gets decent sunlight and go. Go along with the GMRS repeater I have for community/emergency use. I bet parents around here would more likely give their younger kids a tdeck or a radio to call home than turn them loose on a internet connected phone provided it even gets signal some places around here. We had a flood once and were without phone for over a week (exchange was under water) only some cell. Took nearly a month to get internet back. It will be very interesting to see how well they mesh here in the mountains. I think if I can get the high points it with a decent omni and maybe a yagi back to another if it's far away will do well.

Thanks I will look for more.

Great information 👍 Always enjoy your videos. Keep up the good work.

I have two LORA units at my QTH and they are meshed all due to your video many months ago. I got them on Ali Express!

I love this channel.👍

I got a Heltec V3 about a month ago, out of sheer curiosity. They are super cheap on eBay, like $25. It was easy to set up and easy to configure. That said, as of May 2024, despite roaming and searching around my area (it's a large metropolitan area) I was not able to pick up other nodes. Given that this is SUPER new tech around here, hopefully this will change soon! Also, the stock antennas the various Heltec V3 kits come with are almost useless. Definitely need to upgrade them. Thanks for always being on the cutting edge of communications, Josh!

I have a couple units setup and it works great. Works better with Androind than Apple IMO. This thing is great for my area that is sometimes difficult to maintain cellular connections.

I had never heard of it until a few months ago. Now a friend and I have a couple of repeater nodes up high in our area.

If my family would move out of California, to were I'm at on the east coast I would buy a few lora mesh devices so we can have our own private form of text communication. I'm trying to get a couple of my neighbors to get thier amateur radio license. I do have a couple meshtastic devices linked up to a neighbor of mine 4 houses away from me.

928Mhz or 915Mhz? First, great video!!! Thank you. So helpful for me. One of the clearest I have seen. Humble question though, I think the link to the antenna is a 915Mhz and yet the Meshtastic device link is to a 928Mhz? Are there 915s and 928s in the U.S.? Compatible?

Found out about it because of you, haven’t started yet. Thinking about setting up a repeater in my area since no one else has so far.

Great video. Correct me if I’m wrong. Isn’t mesh just like APRS but with encryption? And I guess it’s cool to have a little device to play with too. Oh, and no license required as well. Thanks

Josh, in your video, did not see an antenna connected when you connected power to the board.t  It is low power but, the probability that you will fry the radio is not zero.

Not sure if someone has mentioned this but I ran into the issue where my heltec wouldn't show up in the Ports list. It showed up in the "other devices" section in DM. I installed the driver from the their website and it showed up in my ports list. proceed as normal from there.

Is there a way to get this logging GPS locally to track hikes that you go on? Or an easy way to log the messages to a map? I think this would be great for scouting and other outdoor hobbies.

You spoke about printing the case as was wondering what printer you used.