Harry: I have had my Orion since late 2003. If I had waited I would
not have had access to the finest receiver I have had the pleasure of
using during my 40 years of hamming. I may well have missed working
several dxcc entities on 160/80 that I might not have heard with other
radios and I know all of my contesting would not have been the pleasure
it has been. No other receiver performs as well as Orion during crowded
contest band conditions.
I had to learn how to use the Orion several times because of firmware
changes, but that was also kind of fun to figure it out.
I will tell you that if you do not do weak signal dx chasing on the low
bands or contest during the majors then the Orion may not be the radio
for you....it is unlike anything you have used before and there is a
learning curve to it. I still use my TS850 for the casual
ragchew/listening to the bands operations, but when the chips are down
or a new one needs to be dug out of the noise I will turn to the Orion
every time.
Assuming you need the Orion wait if you like, but then you will be
missing out on for that waiting period. Life is short. What is
important to you? Only you can answer that one. Good luck. If you buy
one let me know and I will send you a white paper I wrote to help pvrc
members get up to speed quickly with their new Orions. 73 bob de w9ge
tentec-request@contesting.com wrote:
Send TenTec mailing list submissions to
tentec@contesting.com
To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/tentec
or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to
tentec-request@contesting.com
You can reach the person managing the list at
tentec-owner@contesting.com
When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
than "Re: Contents of TenTec digest..."
Today's Topics:
1. Should I buy an Orion now or wait? (Harry Reed)
2. Re: Omni C (dnelsen@integraonline.com)
3. Re: Should I buy an Orion now or wait? (Dean Showalter)
4. Re: Omni C (Steve Sloane)
5. Re: Should I buy an Orion now or wait? (Bill Rowlett)
6. Re: Should I buy an Orion now or wait? (CATFISHTWO@aol.com)
7. Re: Orion panel readability (CATFISHTWO@aol.com)
8. Re: Should I buy an Orion now or wait? (k3hx@juno.com)
9. Re: Should I buy an Orion now or wait? (CATFISHTWO@aol.com)
10. Omni C (bob tadlock)
11. Re: Omni C (dnelsen@integraonline.com)
12. Should I buy an Orion now or wait (Bill Tippett)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message: 1
Date: Thu, 16 Jun 2005 09:55:20 -0700
From: Harry Reed <doon@infoscientific.com>
Subject: [TenTec] Should I buy an Orion now or wait?
To: tentec@contesting.com
Message-ID: <42B1AEF8.9070304@infoscientific.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
Hi, All.
As I am new to this reflector, if this has already been discussed
please forgive me. If I step on some toes, please forgive me and please
bear with me.
I am contemplating the purchase of an Orion in the near future. My
question for all you TT and Orion fans is should I purchase one now or
wait? I ask this because ...
1) the DragonBall processor used by the Orion has been EOL'd
(discontinued) by Freescale/Motorola. Does this imply that TT will be
upgrading the Orion to another processor when their supply of
DragonBall's runs out? or does it mean that an Orion+ or Orion II is on
the horizon?
2) From what I've read about Orion it has the potential of being a
truly awesome rig, but given the somewhat unstable nature of it's
firmware etc. can it truly live up to it's potential in it's present
incarnation? or will a hardware upgrade(s) be necessary to fix all of
the little nits?
Also, how has TT done things in the past with previous models? I
gather that the Omni series went through several upgrades/incarnations.
How did TT deal with their existing Omni customers? Given that TT's
supply of DragonBalls has to be finite when they do refit the Orion with
a new processor(s) is TT likely to retrofit existing Orions with the new
chips(s) for a suitable fee or just tell existing customers, "Sorry,
just buy our new 'Orion 2 double-plus good' rig and all of your problems
will be solved?" While I've heard great things about TT support I
contacted TT with similar concerns and got the standard marketing
dribble about they are not at liberty to discuss this sort of thing.
<Sigh> To be fair to TT, I suppose their response was reasonable from a
sales/marketing standpoint as my questions were rather pointed.
Unfortunately, TT did nothing to reassure me that the Orion is a worthy
rig to spend ~$4000 on either!
I really *want* to purchase an Orion, but the question is "when" - now
or later?
What say ye?
Cheers & 73's
Harry Reed, AB7YF
|