I love my Omni-C, corsair and the Omni VI Opt.3. Either one beats the pants
off the Icom IC-756 in weak signal work, and the Corsair and Omni VI are
great when conditions are really tough with weak signals in the holes
between strong signals...
The Orion would be attractive and I would consider buying one if:
1. It didn't have that silly sub receiver, for general coverage which is
inferior to the "main", ham band only receiver.
(for general coverage, I can use any general coverage receiver and
wouldn't do SWL'ing on my main transceiver anyway...)
2. It didn't have that silly spectrum display (I never used it on the Icom
756 either, it was useless there too...)
I just won't spend the money on these - to me - useless things.
I think T-T could sell a ham-band only version of the Orion design,
without the spectrum display, with full functionality
as a great contesting/weak signal rig, for a much more attractive price.
The software would be much simpler as well.
It'd be like a new generation Omni VI...
The software problems I hear about constantly don't bother me, it'd be
straightened out eventually, with enough input
from users. One thing I'm weary about is that in many SDR radios the
software and processing tries to mask the
shortcomings of the poor RF design. I'm not saying it's an Orion thing, I
think the RF design is fairly sound (used to
make my living as an EE) but give me the good solid bread and butter
HDR - "hardware defined radio" ;-) with some
software control options and that's what I'm happy with (oh, this sounds
like the Omni VI...).
My 2 cents' worth into the fray.
73 and best holiday wishes to all,
Meir WF2U
Landrum, SC
_______________________________________________
TenTec mailing list
TenTec@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/tentec
|