I think Rob is right on with his analysis on this.
>
> From: "Rob Atkinson, K5UJ" <k5uj@hotmail.com>
To: <tentec@contesting.com>
> Date: 2002/04/26 Fri PM 02:05:17 EDT
> To: tentec@contesting.com
> Subject: Re: [TenTec] Jupiter taking a beating?
>
>
> I have some theories as to why TT gets beat up on. First, I should say I do
> not own a Jupiter and have never seen one in operation. Also, in general,
> the eham reviews lean towards getting wedge driven. That means that one guy
> gets on there with a lot of anger (some widget he bought didn't do what he
> wanted it to do...he's mad about it) and the anger comes out as hyperbole.
> Another owner of same product retaliates with an extreme 5/5 review. Others
> take sides. And so we have a wedge driving the reviews to the 0/5-5/5
> margins. This has happened with a lot of different products.
>
> 1. Some hams make their choice of equipment purchase an extension of their
> identity and that becomes an allegiance to a manufacturer, to an extent that
> it almost is like a religion. They become hypersensitive to criticism of
> their rig(s) reacting emotionally as if they received a personal insult. A
> few weeks ago a guy on an Icom list became very upset when someone mentioned
> that the Orion might give the ProII some competition. In a twisted way,
> bashing TT becomes an agenda. The decision to spend $3K or $4K on the JA
> rig must be defended so they can feel secure about their purchase. These
> guys need to take a couple weeks off from ham radio.
>
> 2. Personal computers, cordless phones, cell phones, and other component
> systems sold as turn-key products (you get everything you need as a package,
> get everything out of the box, hook it all up and it works) have made
> consumers accustomed to ease of operation. Hams, especially those licensed
> after oh, around 1985 perhaps, may be apt to expect a ham station to work
> the same way. Buy all this stuff, hook it all up, put up an antenna,
> everything should work fine. Except ham stations (as we all know) don't
> always come together that easily due to a large number of variables from one
> site to the next. Other companies may make their radios more idiot proof in
> some way, with some sacrifice of performance. TT has always seemed to push
> the design envelope and perhaps that has resulted in some lack of robustness
> for great performance in some cases and they probably figure hams are
> willing to make the tradeoff. Part of the hobby and the fun is supposed to
> be troubleshooting your system (getting rid of rf feedback for example)
> except it seems like more hams today (OTs included) expect everything they
> need in the box, and want it all to be perfect no matter what, and if that
> doesn't happen they jump on eham and vent. Probably before even talking to
> the company about the problem I might add. To that end, some of today's
> hams seem more like general consumers with very little patience compared to
> 25 or 30 years ago.
>
> Rob Atkinson
> K5UJ
> k5uj@hotmail.com
>
> VI/3, Corsair II, Centurion, 238A
>
>
>
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