I want to be emperor

Chapter 1146 Wireless Telephones

Sound equipment has actually been available in the Dachu Empire for a long time.

In the early years, scientists discovered that sound is a wave produced by the vibration of an object. Based on this principle, there are many series of applications.

For example, the microphones used on the warships of the Da Chu Empire were developed and equipped based on this principle. Sound can be transmitted inside the warship through sound transmission pipes... By the way, this is why the Da Chu Empire Navy pays more attention to the speaking requirements of officers and soldiers. Loud and energetic... Because when using this kind of microphone inside a battleship, you have to shout loudly, otherwise the sound transmission will not be clear enough and the transmission distance will not be far enough.

The same is true for the microphones on the hot air balloon that communicate with people on the ground.

Even though the Dachu Empire has invented the telephone, and has begun to gradually use the telephone for internal communications on battleships, observation balloons and ground communications, the scale of application is very small and the stability is not high.

Therefore, even the most advanced warships today still use a microphone for their internal communication system.

Not to mention the contemporary Chu Empire, even new warships built during World War II or even some time after the war still have microphones for internal communications, at least as a backup communication system...

The reason why its vitality is so long is simple: reliable!

Reliability is indispensable for warships used in war.

In the Dachu Empire, in addition to using microphones for military needs such as battleships, a device for recording and playing sounds, namely a phonograph, was also invented based on the principle of sound vibration.

In the early 1940s, equipment such as phonographs had already appeared on the market, but it did not become popular on a large scale in the early years. It was mainly used as a scientific research, science popularization, and toy for the rich. The imperial archives also used it in small quantities. To record special sounds for preservation, such as recording Luo Zhixue’s speech.

Therefore, although phonographs and records appeared, they were not widely used. Most ordinary people did not even know that such a thing existed.

But after the late 1940s, as the technology matured and relatively low-cost records were successfully developed, and the phonograph technology also matured and the cost dropped, some companies began to see this part of the market and began to use records to infuse opera. Music and other sound content and sell it.

This formed the Chu Empire and the early recording industry in human history. It quickly became popular among the high-income class after entering the 1950s.

The discovery and application of the principle of sound vibration also later promoted the invention of electromagnetic audio equipment, which was the earliest telephone.

The magnet phone invented in the laboratory in the early days of the Dachu Empire used the principle of sound vibration.

However, for a long time, the so-called telephones were actually single-line telephones, mainly used for scientific research and important military applications... For example, not long after the telephone was invented, the first important practical application was to build the imperial palace and Jinling City. The camps of the internal and external Guards are the so-called important communication tools for the emperor to directly contact the Guards.

Later, after the invention of the industrial electric telephone, the application of telephones gradually spread. However, due to the high price, it was still limited to administrative and military applications, as well as internal communications of some large enterprises, and the real commercial private There are still relatively few applications.

Telephones these days are still too expensive. Not only are the telephone equipment expensive, but the telephone network is even more expensive... At the same time, because of the high price, the number of ordinary commercial users is very small, and the small number of users in turn leads to extremely expensive prices.

This leads to a very embarrassing situation: because the price is expensive and there are few users, the few users mean that the cost cannot be shared equally.

Therefore, the contemporary Da Chu Empire's telephone is still a kind of military equipment and a toy for the rich, and it has not become popular on a large scale for the time being.

However, the emergence of telephones and the emergence of radio equipment, when combined, indirectly promoted the successful development of equipment such as radios!

However, it is worth noting that the radio broadcasting system developed by the Electromagnetic Laboratory of the Royal Institute of Technology, well, includes a radio... In this system, the radio is actually just a terminal for receiving information.

From the beginning, this thing was not actually developed as a commercial device such as radio broadcasting, but as a military wireless telephone communication technology...

After the wired telephone technology was gradually applied to the military, the Military Academy felt that although wired telephones were very easy to use, they still had great limitations. When transmitting information, telephone lines needed to be set up, and most of the time telephone calls could only be made via single lines. ; Once the phone line is disconnected by various factors, it will cause the phone to be unable to communicate... Although there is a wireless telegraph machine, it is troublesome to transcode and translate the wireless telegraph machine.

So I put forward a new request, can we make a wireless phone?

After all, text information can be transmitted wirelessly, so sound information should also be transmitted wirelessly... Well, it shouldn't be a big problem, right?

Yes, in these days... the overall industrial technology is equivalent to the level of the Chu Empire in early 1900, and its military has already put forward the communication needs for wireless phones... At first glance, it seems to be an exaggeration, but in fact This is also a very reasonable assumption.

After all, wireless telegraphy and wired telephones have been developed, so it is normal for the military to want to go further and develop a wireless telephone communication system.

Of course, the military has no intention of turning wireless phones into a wireless phone system that can be widely connected to the Internet, portable and can make calls everywhere... Their imagination is not that big, and the demand is not that high.

They just want a simple radiotelephone device that doesn't need to be portable... The probably need is to directly convert the electromagnetic signal information in wireless telegraphy into sound.

After hearing this demand, the professors at the Royal Institute of Technology combined the wireless telegraph system with the wired telephone system, and finally came up with this so-called 'battlefield wireless voice communication system'...

Therefore, the radio that Luo Zhixue saw in the electromagnetic laboratory that day... was actually just one of the receiving terminals, and it also had an independent transmitting device.

The two pieces of equipment are combined together to form a complete radio communication system developed by the Electromagnetic Laboratory and suitable for military needs.

The only problem is...this thing can't be kept secret.

Because the emitted radio electromagnetic wave signal, as long as the frequency is adjusted correctly, can be received by all receiving terminals... and because it uses sound information directly, it is equivalent to clear code information... Not to mention confidential, it does not even translate the code. Need... The main thing is that you can accept it and listen to it casually.

Similarly, as long as there is a receiving terminal, it can receive sound signals of all frequencies supported by the device.

At the same time, the transmission of voice information is more troublesome than the transmission of simple text information. If you want to transmit it over a long distance, there are greater requirements for the transmitting equipment.

So after evaluation by the military... this thing is very good, but it doesn't feel practical!

It is especially difficult to deal with situations where confidentiality cannot be maintained. The military does not want a group of meddlesome people to use the radio to receive various combat orders when they issue various combat orders through wireless phones. There may even be meddlesome individuals who directly sneak into this channel. Use a transmitting device to convey sound information.

Why don't you mess around?

As for the codewords, and then the receiving terminal translates them after hearing the codewords... the military generals think that it is unnecessary to take off the trousers to fart. In this case, it can be done directly with confidential coded radio communications... There is no need to use any wireless phones.

Therefore, the battlefield wireless telephone communication system developed as a military communication technology... Although the name is quite good, it also has too many problems, so it is still being developed as a reserve technology!

How should I put it, at least there must be certain confidentiality measures, at least to prevent combat instructions from being heard by anyone... Even if the indigenous people cannot understand it, it is not good for ordinary civilians to hear it!

The army of the Dachu Empire not only fought against foreign natives... but also against all kinds of potential domestic enemies.

If you use communication technology without security measures, and rebels appear later, and you use wireless phones without security measures, this does not mean that all your military movements are directly sent to the hands of the rebels!

Therefore, the current military wireless telephone communication system is still undergoing follow-up research and development, and the research and development goals are mainly confidentiality and miniaturization.

The wireless telephone communication technology systems previously developed for the military were all large, much larger than the wireless telegraph system.

If you want this thing to work, you have to prepare a special generator for power supply, which is quite troublesome.

However, although this thing has many problems for military use and is not reliable for the time being, when Luo Zhixue saw this thing, the first thing he thought of was not battlefield wireless telephone communications, but radio broadcasts and radios.

Military use has confidentiality and many other requirements, and it also requires equipment to have both a receiving terminal and a transmitting terminal. But radio broadcasting does not require these things... Ordinary users only need a simple receiving terminal to receive radio information.

As for transmitting, the transmitting equipment used by radio broadcasting stations does not need to consider the size, weight or power consumption issues. It can be made extremely large... and even the transmitting wires can be directly placed on the roof of a building several hundred meters high.

At the same time, various wave bands can be used for signal transmission at different distances.

From a technical point of view, the technical difficulty of radio broadcasting is much lower than that of wireless telephones used by battlefield military...

This can also be seen from the technological development context of the original time and space. Wireless telephone systems were not developed until around the 1930s and were used in military fields, such as aircraft. Before the outbreak of World War II, many aircraft had already been equipped with radio systems for use in aircraft. Telephone communications between aircraft and ships, and on the ground.

For example, Fuso's Type 96 Ship Combat Type was a product of the mid-s.

Later, advanced tanks from various countries also successively installed wireless phone systems.

Compared with the development of military wireless telephone technology that was delayed until the 1930s, radio broadcasting matured earlier. Commercial radio stations had already appeared in the 1920s.

As for technological breakthroughs, they will come much earlier.

As for the Chu Empire, the wireless phone technology used for military communications is not yet mature and has little practicality.

However, the radio broadcast system is a bit messy, and Luo Zhixue personally values ​​this.

After all, wireless phones are unlikely to be used on a large scale in the contemporary era, or even for many years to come, due to technical cost and other factors. Wireless phone systems that are only used in the military field are of little use to Luo Zhixue and are not of much use. Big interest... Anyway, with the continuous development of technology, all these things will be available, and the demand is not too urgent.

As for radio broadcasting, Luo Zhixue is more personally interested, because this thing can become a very good propaganda carrier.

Just like contemporary newspapers, it is used as a public opinion propaganda tool.

Let the people know all kinds of information in a timely manner, especially the information from Jinling and the emperor... to avoid being deceived and misunderstood by others, especially local officials.

Why were there so many rebellions in ancient times? Those powerful men and generals could easily incite soldiers, even middle and low-level officers, many local officials, gentry, and ordinary people to follow them in rebellion?

It's because the information was blocked...Many people actually didn't know that he was going to rebel at first, and thought that someone else was rebelling. They were following the loyal generals to counter the rebellion...and then they foolishly went to fight with the people who came to counter the rebellion. The imperial army fought.

After a lot of fighting, I realized that Nima himself was the rebel!

A very critical point here is that the information channels are blocked. A large number of middle and low-level officers, local officials and gentry, as well as soldiers and ordinary people are unable to understand the information of the higher levels, especially the court... All that is known is the top. Various messages fabricated by the leaders of the rebellion.

From then on, he became a rebel...

This kind of thing was very common in ancient times.

This kind of risk existed in the Chu Empire before, but Luo Zhixue's prestige was too high and there was no internal rebellion, so this kind of thing did not happen.

When the telegraph system appeared, especially after wireless telegraphy appeared and began to be equipped with the army, this risk was greatly reduced, because with the emergence of telegraph, front-line troops can more conveniently and quickly receive telegram information from higher levels. , such as telegram messages from the army, army group and even Jinling.

To a certain extent, an external regiment-level unit can contact Jinling via telegram and ask whether there is a rebellion, whether there is a counter-insurgency combat order, and other information.

Even if ambitious people cut off the telephone lines, they can't stop front-line troops from using wireless telegraphy to communicate with their superiors...

Of course, if you directly control the telegraph equipment and then forge messages... that is another matter.

This is still talking about communications within the army, but it can also have similar effects in local government and even among the people.

However, the wireless telegraph system still has very large limitations... At least wireless telegraphy is still relatively restrictive so far.

Because radio information transmission requires occupying frequencies, in order to avoid signal conflicts between military communications, official administrative communications, and commercial communications; at the same time, many individuals purchased wireless telegraph machines at the beginning, and then began to send messages indiscriminately, causing radio pollution.

Therefore, after the application of wireless telegraphy, the empire quickly promulgated corresponding radio management laws, which stipulated that individuals were not allowed to purchase at will, use wireless stations to transmit information, and must go through special study and examination, and register before they can purchase and use wireless telegraph machines. To transmit information...well, it is not necessary to receive radio information.

At the same time, enterprises and institutions that purchase and use wireless telegraphy equipment also need to undergo special registration and review. They can only be used after approval, and can only be used within the specified frequency range. Military, administrative, and communication frequencies are not allowed to be occupied.

Therefore, it is actually more difficult for individuals to get access to wireless telegraphy... because this thing is different from conventional electrical equipment and cannot be purchased casually. You have to go to the telegraph office to register and purchase it.

Contemporary wireless telegraph equipment is also patented, and the authorization for its civilian parts is in the hands of the Telegraph Bureau, so it can only be sold by the Telegraph Bureau. The model is that the Telegraph Bureau authorizes various electrical companies to conduct research and development and production, and then hands it over to the Telegraph Bureau. for sale or use.

Military and administrative wireless telegraphy equipment does not have to be so troublesome, because there is a separate patent authorization, and the military and administrative agencies can directly go to electrical companies for research and development and purchase.

But for civilian wireless telegraph machines, those electrical companies have no right to produce and sell them on their own... they don't have that patent authorization.

Therefore, in the contemporary Dachu Empire, if companies or individuals want to obtain wireless telegraph machines, they can only apply for purchase from the telegraph bureau.

Of course... as long as you make a legal purchase, the telegraph office will generally not block you, but you still need to register and undergo a qualification review.

This has nothing to do with radio communication leaks or anything like that. It is purely to avoid radio pollution... If it is not managed, all kinds of messy radio waves will fly all over the sky, causing interference and conflict with each other.

To put it simply, the radio management of the contemporary Dachu Empire is to stop individual and corporate users from messing around...

Because there are some restrictions, and wireless telegraph machines are quite expensive, they are actually out of reach for ordinary individuals... If you need to send telegrams on a daily basis, you go directly to the telegraph office to send them, and the telegraph offices accept them. Then it will be sent to you by mail.

Under such circumstances, Luo Zhixue believes that a simpler model is needed to deliver information to local agencies, the military and even ordinary people in a point-to-point manner.

Radio is a very good tool for transmitting information.

Moreover, the receiving terminal in the radio broadcasting system, that is, the part of the radio that does not need to send information, and because it receives signals in several fixed frequency bands, the overall research and development difficulty and production cost can be well controlled!

This means that the cost of radios is relatively low, and at least it can be mass-produced as a high-end furniture or office equipment and entered into high-income homes or institutions or commercial places.

And this is the prerequisite for establishing a large-scale, wide-area radio broadcasting system!