[TenTec] Re: Orion & software upgrades scenario

[Duane Grotophorst]

--- Bill Steffey <ny9h@arrl.net> wrote:
> Are we ready and willing to PAY 80$- $100 to be able
> to upload NEW FEATURES 
> AND BENEFITS  a year or two after initial release
> ??.
> All the subtle fixes would be free on the initial
> Feature Set, yet at some 
> point are we willing to pay for additional features?

I'm sure many would, but unless there is a viable 
means to protect from firmware piracy it would be
difficult to make a good business case to support
charging for the firmware upgrades. I believe Kachina
attempted to charge for firmware upgrades and that may
have been a sore spot for many of the original buyers,
especially if the newer firmware fixed a defect vs.
just adding a feature.  And don't forget, hams are
notoriously cheap. 

>  The Japanese plan on 
> NOT having a problem with upgrades. At what point is
> it fair AND 
> APPROPRIATE to expect TenTec to be able to charge
> for additional stuff, 
> that was NOT sold to us as in the original radio:(
> Orion or Peg/Jup). I 
> suppose likewise for Carl's software.
> Maybe the Japanese just want to draw a line in the
> sand. Once shipped, 
> that's it. New stuff= new radio.

Yup, the Japanese manufactures surely don't have a
problem with those pesky software upgrades because
they have a far better (so far) methodology of making
everyone buy a new radio no matter how small a change
they make. But they aren't fools, I'm sure it's just a
matter of time until they too adopt update-able
firmware designs as well.

 TenTec also has too
> recover software 
> expense, or maybe Carl will.  (This might change the
> drift of the reflector.)

I think the logic TT is following is that they are in
the radio hardware business, not software. They
obviously need to put large effort into developing the
firmware, but it is more of an incidental requirement
driven by the design philosophy they have chosen.
Making new firmware available on a reasonably frequent
basis is a strong selling feature, and will continue
to become more of an advantage as time goes on. As
more people begin to recognize the value of that
capability they will sell more hardware, .... TT's
original goal. But in order for that feature to fully
exploited though they do need to be proactive in
adding/changing features, if it is not they will be
throwing away so much of what it can do for all of us.

Also keep in mind the work that Carl has been doing is
on a different level than the radio firmware.
Therefore it is a somewhat different issue. However it
does share the same need for a proactive development
effort. What is critical for that side of software
development is strong support in the form of good
usable programming information from the factory for
third party developers. Historically that issue alone
has either made or broke computer oriented hardware
companies in the past. There's no reason to believe
that the software radio centric amateur radio world
will be any different.

So far nothing in the Orion literature indicates that
there will be software control features, .....
incredibly foolish if they don't. Though I suspect it
will be handled more like the RX-350 has been, which
has just recently had that capability added.
Unfortunately it looks as though whatever computer
control capability there may be in the Orion will be
limited to what can be done over a RS232 connection
(based on the Orion back panel pix). If so, a major
missed opportunity to significantly raise the bar for
computer integration capability, we'll just have to
wait and see. 

Duane
N9DG


__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Try FREE Yahoo! Mail - the world's greatest free email!
http://mail.yahoo.com/