[TenTec] new owner Orion

[RM]

Come On Skip,

My Icom 765 didn't come with a Mike; my Icom 775DSP didn't come with a mike
and that radio  without the filters cost more that the Orion with all of the
optional filters and antenna tuner............

"This is piss poor American quality control."  You are or were an American
worker, right?

I agree that the manual needs more work for the average ham.  The few rare
occasions that I go to the manual, I do have a time finding specific
functions.

Quality, I could tell you how quality was taken out of the two Icoms I have
here....cheap paper capacitors, tuning encoders that freeze up, dual
recievers that fed back on the DX CW receive frequency........ Didn't have a
30 day return policy or free changes on defective designs.......

As far as the 'cheap' display..... I'll say thanks for providing a lower
cost alternative for a digital display. TenTec did send out a questionnaire
several months ago in which part of it addressed color displays for the
Orion........  My response was that the B/W display is adequate, and that
color would be a 'nice' feature but not at raising the cost of the
radio...... We all have trade offs.....

I've done an a/b comparision with the Orion/Icom 775.  In tough DX/Contest
conditions the Orion blows away the the Icom 775DSP.....  But I spent a lot
of time of learning to manipulate the AGC system on this rig.......

Ron .... NU1U
As you probably noticed by my number of posts this evening, I'M Bored....The
bands aren't too lively tonight.

-----Original Message-----
From: tentec-bounces at contesting.com [mailto:tentec-bounces at contesting.com]
On Behalf Of skip
Sent: Wednesday, September 08, 2004 17:14
To: tentec at contesting.com
Subject: [TenTec] new owner Orion

When I unpacked my Orion the Main tuning knobs fell off.  I guess that's why
they give you the hex keys.

The main display was unreadable, a bright almost white light.  It took some
reading of a very poor manual to figure out how to correct the problem with
the cheap LCD screen.

This is piss poor American quality control.

The manual is a joke.  It looks like something a kid would do in his
basement.  Again poor proof reading, and very little info for a novice user.

These are statements of facts people.

As for the performance of the radio I can not comment as yet.

I will use my Yaesu Ft 1000 MP/MkV and a Icom 756 ProII to do an A, B and C
comparison.

My thoughts about the radio are, without Carl's N4YP software I would send
it back, the display is  real cheap for the touted radio quality.  I don't
like a multi function control which does everything from a menu.  I do admit
the box looks better in person than in the pictures.  And what's with an ALC
light ?????   Why did Ten Tec use a mini stereo phone plug for the paddle
input ????  Everyone else uses a standard 1/4" plug.
Hey, a $3,500 radio and NO mic ??????

I have had my Orion for about 2 weeks and it works OK accept for the sweep
display issues and unstable display.

These are my first impressions, lets hope the radio performance can redeem
itself.

de Skip     K3CC

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