Hello Group,
I am a Beta tester for engineering at TT and am very proud to have been
selected to participate in the commissioning of the Orion and software.
I am, by nature, a very analytical individual with a positive team spirit
attitude. I have owned the Orion for one year now and I've got to tell you,
this is the best rig I have ever owned. It wasn't an easy decision to sell my
TS-850S, TS-950SDX and IC-756 Proll but they just were not of any use to me
any
more. I still have the TS-830S. Every now and then I fire up the old beast
and have some fun for a while. Then turn it off, cover it up and its back to
the Orion.
It is a real pleasure to finally have a rig that allows me to control
features that other manufactures don't allow. If you own an Orion, you know
what
I'm talking about.
There are 23 Beta Testers working with engineering at TT right now and each
is an expert in there own fields (including programming) of operation. My
expertise is SSB and general operation only. These are the features that I
will
be commissioning in the next beta release. Which, by the way, should be
released for testing sometime this month baring no "Gotchas".
There is an old saying in the software programming world that goes something
like this:
Debugging is twice as hard as writing the code in the first place.
Therefore, if you write the code as cleverly as possible, you are,
by definition, not smart enough to debug it. (reprint)
This is why TT (or any other manufacturer) has beta testers and encourages
positive constructive input from its equipment users. Non-constructive
negative or slanderous remarks about a product contribute absolutely nothing
to its
improvement or enhancement.
If you own an Orion, Jupiter, Pegasus or even an SDR-1000 I would encourage
you to purchase what's call a "T-4 Line Isolator" and install it right at the
antenna outputs of the rig. I also would encourage you to install ferrite
beads or Radio Shacks "Ice Cube" ferrite on the keying line going from the rig
to your linear. Installation of these two items will allow for trouble free
operation of your SDR.
I never had to use these components on any of my other rigs, but they were
not computer based ham radio transceivers either.
I can guarantee you that Kenwood, Yeasu and Icom are working on software
based rigs to be released probably before the peak of the next solar cycle. It
only makes sense to manufacture a rig using 75% less components and to sell it
for twice the price. These people are not stupid. Its coming.....get ready,
ham radio will never be the same.
I bought the Orion for what it is, a software based ham radio transceiver
that allows ME, the user, to have control over features that, in my opinion,
are very important.
If you don't own an Orion, you owe it to yourself to try one and compare it
to other rigs you may have or to other rigs on the market today.
If you have owned an Orion and didn't like it.......that's cool! You can't
please everyone.
FWIW
73
John / N0KHQ / St. Louis
http://www.hamuniverse.com/antennas.html
http://www.cebik.com/moxon/n0khq.html
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