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[TenTec] Re: Continuing Orion evaluation/Dragonball

To: <tentec@contesting.com>
Subject: [TenTec] Re: Continuing Orion evaluation/Dragonball
From: n9dg@yahoo.com (Duane Grotophorst)
Date: Mon Aug 11 23:59:56 2003
--- "George,  W5YR" <w5yr@att.net> wrote:
> Mark, my experience mirrors yours. I find that I
> have come to depend almost
> unconsciously on being able to see what is happening
> around my tuned
> frequency.

My experience with spectrum display actually exceeds
both of yours (if such a statement makes any
grammatical sense). I've come to the point where I
feel like I have tunnel vision when having to depend
on a simple digital display for telling me where I am
in the band. Not to mention the total lack of
awareness of what is happening up and down the band
without having that spectrum display telling me
visually.

> The PRO2 greatly improved the SS over the original
> PRO. It is now possible
> to see very weak signals down to the noise level and
> detect their presence
> both by sound and scope.

I find with N4PY software running in dual Pegasus mode
that I can find some surprisingly weak signals on a
band where the background noise is quite low such as
with 2M weak signal work.

> It is interesting that in the design of the PRO2,
> the SS is a completely
> separate receiver in every respect so its
> characteristics can be set -
> attenuation, span, etc. without regard to affecting
> the operation of the
> main receiver(s).

With N4PY software running in dual Pegasus mode you
have more or less the same thing, but with a mouse
click or two you can have 2 separate RX's as well.

> The SS is something that one has to live with for
> awhile to really
> appreciate what all it is showing you.

Not at all, it took me all of 30 seconds to figure out
that it is the cat's meow for quickly determining the
presence of signals across a band or its general
propagation condition overall. 

> But take it
> away, and I really miss
> it in a hurry!

Yupp, and I've gotten to the point where I won't even
go into a VHF contest anymore without it up and
running on 6&2M.

 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Mark Erbaugh" <mark@microenh.com>
> I have owned both the Icom 756 and 756 Pro (which
> I sold in anticipation of the Orion). I found the 
> spectrum display very usable in those radios.

My main reservation about the spectrum display being
on the radio itself is that they are always too small.
To really gain a true appreciation for what it can do
for you; it really needs to be on a nice big computer
monitor.

Duane
N9DG


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