Hi Rick,
I read your posting with interest. Thanks for doing these tests.
Operating on 40M at night in your part of Europe is certainly a
challenge. I was a little surprised at your results since we have had
previous tests performed by Peter, DL2FI, in Berlin with a similar 40M
large signal environment that had much better results.
One thought - Do you know if you had your K2 OPT Menu item set for low
or high iP mode? It is in low iP when it is in OPT = BATT mode. If you
were set in this mode our iP is degraded by about 10 dB since the post
mixer amplifier is set to a lower bias current for battery operation.
The High iP position is OPT = PERF. (Several test labs have made this
error in the past.)
One other thought - Testing with the pre-amp turned on with regular
antennas on 40M is probably overkill as both the Orion and the K2 have
much more than the required sensitivity on 40M with the pre-amp off. Few
operators will ever need to use the pre-amp on 40M, unless they are
using very small antennas which of course also reduce all signal levels
by a large amount.
In any case we're pleased to be compared to the Orion and to even be
mentioned in the same category. It has an excellent receiver. This
certainly exceeds our original goals when we first designed the K2. :-)
73, Eric Swartz
WA6HHQ, Elecraft
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NJ0IP wrote:
The following is a brief comparison of the latest K2 (s/n 4606) and the
ORION (s/n 10C10593) on the 40m band, tonight (28-FEB-05).
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