All of you Engineers and micro-bit chasers, you can delete this
without reading it. It is subjective - not measured.
I finally had an opportunity to use an Orion in a big contest -
although just for 3 hours.
I used it from my home QTH where my only antenna is an 80m dipole
fed with openwire thru the world's best high-power symmetrical
matchbox (Annecke).
My previous radio was an Omni VI+.
My last serious contest with the Omni was CQWW CW 2003, so it's
been a while.
I no longer have the Omni so I had no cance to "A/B" the two.
Therefore this is VERY subjective.
Here some thoughts, no particular priority:
1. We're having lots of hideous wx here in EU these days and the
bands were full of static noise. Playing with the AGC really
helped to quiet the band down. This is a feature I didn't have
on the Omni VI+.
2. Especially on 40 and 80, I ran the DSP bandwidth down to 100
Hz. No ringing, no problems - just clear seperation of stations
being heard.
3. Downside: several times two stations were calling CQ "on top
of each other" and I was able to clearly seperate them from each
other. So when I called the one I wanted, I actually got (and
worked) both stations. Interpret it how you want. The main
point is that I could distinguish and copy both seperately
whereas (subjectively) I don't think I could have seperated them
on my Omni.
4. Every 5 KHz I copied W4PA, regardless of which band I was on.
Is this a feature, a bug, or a firmware glitch? ;-)
NO WAY I would go back to an OMNI VI+ (but for the money, a used
OMNI VI+ is probably the best buy on the planet right now).
Next contest plans are for IOTA in 3 weeks. For this contest
I'll take my ORION to one of our BCC's best remote contest QTH's
with lots of BIG (HUGE) antennas. Feedback to follow.
73
Rick (DJ0IP / NJ0IP)
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