Key Points
- Amateur packet radio began in 1978 with the Montreal Amateur Radio Club in Canada.
- The FCC allowed US amateurs to send ASCII computer text in 1980, and a 2-meter packet repeater was running in San Francisco by December that year.
- Affordable TNCs and the common AX.25 protocol made packet boom through the 1980s.
- After home internet arrived, packet lived on in APRS, Winlink and emergency networks that do not depend on the internet.
- Software TNCs and small computers like the Raspberry Pi make a node cheaper to build than ever.
Montreal, 1978
Amateur packet radio began in Canada. In 1978, with permission from the Canadian government, members of the Montreal Amateur Radio Club began sending computer data over VHF using equipment they built themselves.
The United States, 1980
In 1980 the FCC allowed US amateurs to send ASCII computer text over the air. By December of that year, a packet repeater was running on 2 meters in San Francisco, put up by Hank Magnuski, KA6M, and the Pacific Packet Radio Society.
The Boom of the 1980s
What made packet take off was the TNC: a box that did the hard work, so any ham with a radio and a home computer or terminal could get on. Groups such as TAPR (Tucson Amateur Packet Radio) designed TNC kits that were affordable and widely copied, and a common protocol, AX.25, adapted from a commercial data standard, let equipment from different makers talk to each other.
Through the decade, local digipeaters and BBSs sprang up across the country, and networks of nodes linked them together. For many hams this was their first taste of email and online discussion, years before most people had heard of the internet.
After the Internet Arrived
Once home internet became common, much of packet’s chat and bulletin traffic moved there. But packet never went away. APRS, built on packet, took off in the 1990s for position reporting and messaging, and Winlink uses packet on VHF to move radio email.
Emergency communications groups kept packet networks alive precisely because they don’t depend on the internet. And software TNCs and small computers like the Raspberry Pi have made building a node cheaper and easier than it has ever been.
Still Running
Old-timers who built TNCs from kits in the 1980s are still on the air, often alongside newcomers running Direwolf on a laptop. Ask around at a club meeting: someone nearby very likely keeps a node or BBS going, and will be glad of the company.