[TenTec] Jupiter taking a beating?

[duffyb01@fuse.net]

I think Rob is right on with his analysis on this.


> 
> From: "Rob Atkinson, K5UJ" <k5uj@hotmail.com>
> Date: 2002/04/26 Fri PM 02:05:17 EDT
> To: tentec@contesting.com
> Subject: Re: [TenTec] Jupiter taking a beating?
> 
> 
> I have some theories as to why TT gets beat up on.  First, I should say I do 
> not own a Jupiter and have never seen one in operation.  Also, in general, 
> the eham reviews lean towards getting wedge driven.  That means that one guy 
> gets on there with a lot of anger (some widget he bought didn't do what he 
> wanted it to do...he's mad about it) and the anger comes out as hyperbole.  
> Another owner of same product retaliates with an extreme 5/5 review.  Others 
> take sides.  And so we have a wedge driving the reviews to the 0/5-5/5 
> margins. This has happened with a lot of different products.
> 
> 1.  Some hams make their choice of equipment purchase an extension of their 
> identity and that becomes an allegiance to a manufacturer, to an extent that 
> it almost is like a religion.  They become hypersensitive to criticism of 
> their rig(s) reacting emotionally as if they received a personal insult.  A 
> few weeks ago a guy on an Icom list became very upset when someone mentioned 
> that the Orion might give the ProII some competition.  In a twisted way, 
> bashing TT becomes an agenda.  The decision to spend $3K or $4K on the JA 
> rig must be defended so they can feel secure about their purchase.  These 
> guys need to take a couple weeks off from ham radio.
> 
> 2.  Personal computers, cordless phones, cell phones, and other component 
> systems sold as turn-key products (you get everything you need as a package, 
> get everything out of the box, hook it all up and it works) have made 
> consumers accustomed to ease of operation.  Hams, especially those licensed 
> after oh, around 1985 perhaps, may be apt to expect a ham station to work 
> the same way.  Buy all this stuff, hook it all up, put up an antenna, 
> everything should work fine.  Except ham stations (as we all know) don't 
> always come together that easily due to a large number of variables from one 
> site to the next.  Other companies may make their radios more idiot proof in 
> some way, with some sacrifice of performance.  TT has always seemed to push 
> the design envelope and perhaps that has resulted in some lack of robustness 
> for great performance in some cases and they probably figure hams are 
> willing to make the tradeoff.  Part of the hobby and the fun is supposed to 
> be troubleshooting your system (getting rid of rf feedback for example) 
> except it seems like more hams today (OTs included) expect everything they 
> need in the box, and want it all to be perfect no matter what, and if that 
> doesn't happen they jump on eham and vent.  Probably before even talking to 
> the company about the problem I might add.  To that end, some of today's 
> hams seem more like general consumers with very little patience compared to 
> 25 or 30 years ago.
> 
> Rob Atkinson
> K5UJ
> k5uj@hotmail.com
> 
> VI/3, Corsair II, Centurion, 238A
> 
> 
> 
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