I don't have an Orion and have not even seen one in operation but if it is
all it is cracked up to be it will survive a few bad reviews.
I don't mind bad reviews if they are factual and report someone's true
experience. When I'm considering a product I go out of my way to hunt for
bad reviews and pay attention to what the writers have to say. If they are
reporting a true experience it should be there along with the good reviews.
Generally speaking I have more of a problem with rave reviews in eham (I've
given my share of 5s to things too) that go on about how great something is
in a vague way without making any specific observations or citing any
sources of information. The eham review ratings are: 5 - Great!
4 - Good, 3 - OK, 2 - Needs help, 1 - Poor, 0 - Awful! I think there's been
a problem with rating inflation (remember, I'm commenting generally--not
about Orion)--most products I see get 5s. To me, there's nothing wrong with
something being okay. I own lots of gear that are okay. Some good, a few
that are great. Now, if we take the Orion ratings literally, the K6 gave
Orion a 1. that means he said it was poor. Not awful, but poor. So, room
for improvement there. the WB4 gave it a 3 meaning it was okay. I don't
think there's anything wrong with being okay. To me, ideally the vast
majority of stuff that gets reviewed ought to be 3s. 5 should really be
reserved for the rare item that's so good, it could almost be used
professionally or be run in CCS in a rack. Gaming the system by posting
zillions of 5s to jack up the average just adds to the noise in the
sig./noise ratio.
I think it is important for a company to get balanced feedback. No one does
a company any favors by consistently bashing their products, but also, a
company does not benefit from nothing but high praise if they have
manufactured a few duds. What every company deserves is candid frank
assessments. If that's what the 3 and 1 reviews were then they may have
done more good than you think.
73,
Rob Atkinson
K5UJ
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