SSB - Sailmail On A MACBOOK - No Easy Process

We have our SSB installed, but it still needs to be grounded.  That should be done shortly, but the process of making our Mac talk to the SCS Pactor IV Dragon 7400 Bluetooth modem, joining Sailmail and getting it all working was a bit of a pain in the nether regions.

First of all, we have a MacBook Pro computer and not a PC on board, so the fist thing we needed to do was to install Parallels Desktop.  The reason:  all the modem software is for a PC, so we have to get the Mac to pretend its a PC.

It's been a few years, but our old computer was a DELL desktop, and we had Windows XP, so after installing Parallels Desktop, we had to install Windows XP.  Of course it had none of the Microsoft Service Packs, so we had to go on line with an ancient version of Explorer to download all the Service Packs (there are 3) to update XP to where it is now (and where we can get an upgrade to Windows 8 should the spirit move us to so so).  Microsoft's site was intent on getting us to install Explorer 8, which of course we could not do without the operating system being "Service Packed" to the hilt.

After much frustration and time, we had the proper screens:

Windows XP Starting Up on a MacBook Pro

Windows XP needs to be at least past Service Pack 2 to have it look for Bluetooth Devices.  A careful read of the somewhat badly translated (from the original German) Installation Guide lets you know that the pairing key is the latter part of the alpha-numeric string of the modem's serial number.  That alone should be in highlighted text somewhere, but no, it's in the thick text.  

One word here:  do the pairing FROM WITHIN WINDOWS and NOT from Mac OS.  Once done, it works fine.  You get the screen below that shows the Modem paired.

Windows XP in Parallels Desktop 

Showing the Bluetooth Devices Paired

Now for a word on how the modem and the ICOM IC-M802 are connected.   The modem comes with two connection cables and you use both:  One goes from the ACC socket on the ICOM to the 8 pin socket on the modem.  The second goes from the 9 pin REMOTE jack on the ICOM to the 13 pin socket on the modem.  

So you're all set to do Sailmail.  With XP running and the modem bluetooth connection in place, you can start the Sailmail program (which you downloaded and installed in the Windows OS (and NOT the Mac OS)

Starting Sailmail

The Sailmail window allows you to open the "Options" menu and put the Pactor settings in.  You can also compose e-mail messages here, but to send, you click on the little mailbox icon to "post" the message.

Sailmail Window

No comes the interesting part:  to actually send or receive a message, you have to connect to a Sailmail location on one of their frequencies.  To do so, you click on the little blue globe that appears in the line of icons toward the top of the window.   This brings up the other window

The Terminal Window 

Once the terminal window pops up, you can choose the location and frequency of the Sailmail stations and you will see the frequency automatically tuned on the ICOM (a little amazing actually).  Then you hit the green circle on the left side of the window (ensuring the "handshake" button is DOWN - that is ON).  The radio will transmit (and do wild things if it is not fully grounded).  Ours made the most horrific sound that seemed to be coming from elsewhere in the boat.  I have been told to shut off the refrigeration and hang on.