George, W5YR, wrote, in part:
> Pete, I tend to write off the QST review articles.
> However, the ARRL Labs extended test reports are
> creditable and non-political as far as I can see.
I am really looking forward to comments about the Orion
by Tom Rauch, W8JI. He has already had an Orion, not
sure if in his lab/shop or elsewhere at someone else's
QTH. He posted a brief comment the other day, but feels
it is too early to judge the product now: it is still being
"developed", at least the software control/firmware part, hi.
I don't mind that, nor that mine has had to go in for some
piddly repair of a voltage regulator (if that truly is the problem
behind the symptom observed here).
However, even Tom's remarks are going to be biased toward
his application: weak signal, 160 meter operation on CW.
But that will be excellent data whenever presented.
A link to Tom's rcvr test methods:
http://www.w8ji.com/receivers.htm
And a link to his comment to which I refer above about
"early" judging of the Orion:
http://lists.contesting.com/_topband/2003-July/017119.html
and,
http://lists.contesting.com/_topband/2003-July/017130.html
in which this line appears:
"A contester would mainly check for IM performance which I KNOW
is good in the Orion, because I measured one at about 95dB IM3
DR), and DXing would check for weak signals but ONLY if we
A-B'ed the receivers time and time again."
So, given a few more months.....we will begin to really
know how the Orion performs for the most critical:
160 meters DX'n and contesting (next December) and
general band DX'n late October and November coming.
By then, we hope the Orion will be well tweaked, as Tom
has suggested is continuing. After all, the Orion is muchly
a computer; whenever I turn mine on, I get 14 seconds
of "System loading......" time, just as when my computer
boots up, hi.
73, Jim KH7M
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