On 4/25/2014 6:21 AM, Bob McGraw - K4TAX wrote:
Personally, I went a different direction and purchased a RIGOL
DSA815-TG. Now this cost a good bit more, less than $1500 delivered,
but does a LOT MORE in terms of being a piece of test equipment thus
allowing one not only to "see" their signal but make other analysis of
their signal. It has a tracking generator or signal generator that is
quite nice for other work as well. This product was reviewed in QST
some months ago. Performance wise and feature wise it compares
favorably to my $30K HP Spectrum Analyzer, except the DSA815-TG weighs
9 lbs and the HP some 45 lbs. and it is about 1/8the the size of the HP.
I also had the HP 8590D, but added the same Rigol a year or so ago. It's
a convenient tool. but when I was using the Rigol to poke for emissions
from a switching power supply, the emissions from the Rigol's own
switching power supply was a limit on what I could measure. Before I
figured that out, I had also bought a Rigol sampling scope, and am using
that to look at transmitted waveforms, etc.
For monitoring band activity and looking at other transmitted signals,
the P3 on the receiver IF is a winner.
In any event, understanding how to use and analyze the data presented
from any piece of test equipment or station equipment is the advanced
key to success.
Yes.
As to a computer to run the radio and to do logging -- at least part of
the problem is screen real estate. I use the DXLab suite of software to
do logging, process spots, and so on, and it fills most of my screen, so
I would need another screen for the SDR. My ancient Thinkpads running XP
Pro can support that, but if I want to run anything else, like
propagation prediction software, or a browser, I'm out of horsepower and
screen space, and have overflowed to another laptop.
73, Jim K9YC
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