Hi Caity, Grant and all,
Caitlyn Martin wrote:
>Hi, Jim, Grant, and everyone else,
>
>First, I agree with everything Grant said about why general coverage
>can be important. Most general coverage transceivers could also be
>modified when changes in amateur frequency allocations come along. My
>Icom IC-723S (JA QRP version of the IC-728) meets NTIA standards for
>frequency stability on 60m with the CR-64 installed per the NTIA
>website. A simple mod made it 60m ready. Most rigs without general
>coverage would have required much more extensive modification to add a
>band. Of course, a software defined like the Ten Tec Argonaut V and
>Jupiter got a firmware upgrade and all was well.
>
>
First, let me say that I was not putting down general-coverage
reception. Like many potential
hams in the 50s/60s and earlier, I began as a SWL. My first receiver
was a Hallicrafters
SX-110. My amazement was the insistence by many modern-day hams that
such coverage
was included.
Thinking about frequency agility is something that I hadn't considered,
since a lot of time had
passed since the time that hams got the so-called WARC bands and the
recent allocation of the
60m band. My original Drake R-4 and T-4X (which I have to this day)
would receive and
transmit on virtually any frequency between 1.8-30 MHz with additional
crystals. I believe that
the exception was the 5-6 Mhz range, which was an IF.
>I am an avid shortwave listener and I was before I was a ham. I have
>family overseas, mainly in Israel and Europe. I like getting news from
>those places directly, not filtered through American press bias.
>Shortwave is invaluable to me. One of the things that has impressed me
>with Ten Tec is their early adoption of DRM (Digital Radio Mondiale),
>something the big three have ignored. I'd love to see that capability
>in the ham line as well so a separate radio wouldn't be necessary.
>
>
Guess I should revisit the SW BCBs; just not enough hours in the day.
For that purpose I have
an Icom PCR-1000 that I've never used that much because of the
difficulty of getting the software
to work with any version of Windows after Win98. I have a Pegasus
also. Being in the
software development business, I am fascinated with the interfacing of
ham radio hardware with
computers. There is probably an SDR-1000 in my future, although I'm
more interested in the
Linux version of the software than the proprietary M$ C# since I'm
trying to go mostly open-
source between now and retirement.
>There was a time, as Jim correctly points out, when general coverage
>meant sacrificing receiver performance on the ham bands. At that time
>rigs like those offered by Ten Tec, the Icom IC-740, and a handful of
>similar rigs I could mention by the big three, were far superior to the
>rigs with general coverage. That is no longer true and there really is
>no advantage to ham bands only rigs at this time.
>
>
Very true; technology has marched on in this regard!
>Just my .02...
>
>73,
>Caity
>K7VO
>
And a very worthy two cents it was!
73 de Jim - AD6CW
P.S. Caity - why aren't you a member of the list? Let me know if you
want me to add you.
_______________________________________________
TenTec mailing list
TenTec@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/tentec
|