If someone else is already linked to that PMBO but on another frequency the screen will tell you that the PMBO is not available.
It is a bit fiddly at first plus one should not use full power If no one else is on frequency then click on the green symbol on the top of the screen to send your emails. Tune the SSB and antenna to the p3 frequency and listen (NB> the Pactor IIpro will do this automatically for you). Switch on the Pactor and various lights will flash. Select a suitable p3 frequency eg: 10MMHz. The preferred fast transmissions are marked p3, meaning Pactor 3 which sends at 500 characters per second, rather than 140 with Pactor 2. Click on his callsign and a list of his frequencies is displayed. For example from UK my first choice is the PMBO in Italy * then Holland or Germany. When you are ready to send you will need to look into the data base of PMBOs, within the airmail programme, and select one which is at a suitable distance for the frequency and propagation.You can also request GRIB weather reports automatically or by typing the request as described else where in this website.
Purchase a Pactor III modem fitted with Professional Firmware.The following steps are necessary, assuming that you have an SSB and a laptop. NB: the Pactor 2 is slower than the Pactor 3. The best (only?) is made by SCS and is the PTC-IIex or IIpro Pactor 2/3 modems. Airmail is a 32-bit programme which runs under windows-95, 98, NT 2000 or XP. Airmail is a messaging programme (similar to Outlook) specially designed to connection to HF radio. The advantage of Winlink is that it has about 35 stations called PMBOs dotted around the world. Winlink is about 30 mins, which is a large number of emails. Both require the same messaging programme called Airmail which can be downloaded for free. One used by several members is SailMail (membership fee is about $250 pa) but another, which is only available to radio amateurs (Hams) is Winlink and is free. There are two methods for sending and receiving emails using a laptop and an SSB radio.