[RTTY] FSK is bad?

[Bill Turner]

------------ ORIGINAL MESSAGE ------------(may be snipped)

On Mon, 24 Oct 2016 20:04:59 -0400, W4TV wrote:

>
>PSK31 and JT65/JT9 operators have been browbeaten to keep their power
>levels very low - many of the "thought police" claim anything more than
>5W is intentional interference - while the normal RTTY operator will
>run his full transmitter output. 

REPLY:

It should be pointed out that this pressure to use only low power has
nothing to do with the mode, but rather the wide bandwidth at the
receiver end to enable the "waterfall" display which people seem to
love. Just one strong signal anywhere in the receiver bandwidth will
cause the receiver's ALC to crank down the gain for everybody. 

By contrast, RTTY operators traditionally use a very narrow receive
bandwidth to begin with and the ALC issue no longer exists and high
power is the rule. 

It would be interesting to see how much more DX the PSK and JT mode
ops could work if they used very narrow bandwidths and high power. I'm
not holding my breath on that, however. 

73, Bill W6WRT