[TenTec] TT (Orion) Future improvements!!!

[Tommy]

This is my opinion only!

I think it's becoming obvious that what the ham radio user community 
wants in a radio has changed to more 'glitz' that actual operational 
performance. Ten Tec probably designed the Orion with customer 
loyalty in mind, the 'IY' manufacturers designed their latest rig's 
with the customer's wallet in mind. (Acknowledging the 'IY' 
manufacterers current radios technical performance IS quite good.) 
The Orion is just about as perfect 'hardware design' as one could 
ask from amateur equipment. The ONLY snaffu in the Orion design is 
possible the added stages of amplification on the last two narrow 
roofing filter positions, done with their user community in mind. 
The selectable roofing filters, which help provide the very best 
receiver performance available kinda caught the competition grasping 
for some way to use the term 'roofing filter'. Ten Tec again, with 
the user community (cost to the user) in mind, used a non-color 
display. The concept of a near-perfect hardware design and firmware 
downloadable updates should have been a 'killer' system for the ham 
community IF the ham community was still technical-orionted.

Two major problems; 1) The very old addage "One aw-s**t will kill a 
thousand 'Atta-Boys'!" remains true today. While the Orion is an 
extremely excellent hardware design, Ten Tec kinda dropped the ball 
with the Orion's firmware; 2) probably 95% of today's ham community 
think a color screen (so to speak) is much more important than 
actual radio performance under extreme operating conditions.

What I saw yesterday at the Orlando hamfest kinda brings home the 
point about today's hams. During my walk around at that hamfest what 
I saw was shocking to me.

First walk through approximate number of ham visitors:

Yaesu booth:        25 to 30 visitors at the booth.
Icom booth:          30 to 40 visitors at the booth.
Elecraft booth:      10 to 15 visitior at the booth.
FlexRadio booth:  8 to 10 visitors at the booth.
Ten Tec booth:      Only person present was the sales guy.

Two hours later:

Yaesu booth:       20-30 visitors
Icom booth:         20-30 visitors
Elcraft booth:       8-10 visitors
FlexRadio booth: 5-10 visitors
Ten Tec booth:    Myself and the TT sales guy.

My immediate impression was the non-technical ham of today probably 
ranks pretty color screens over pure absolute technical performance. 
I think even if Ten Tec had a flawless firmware package in the Orion 
today, the 'average' ham would prefer showing his friends the 
'pretty color screen' and boast about how much it cost instead of 
proudly boasting about the technical excellence of their Orion.

In my opinion, the "Guys @ TT" had the wisdom to produce the best 
hardware design offered to the ham community on their first try, and 
I personally do not see the need for "Hardware" improvements via an 
Orion Pro II, or what ever. Of course, advancement in technology 
would require such, in the future.

Tom - W4BQF

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jim Davis" <nn6ee at yahoo.com>
To: "Ten-Tec List" <tentec at contesting.com>
Sent: Sunday, February 13, 2005 1:51 PM
Subject: [TenTec] TT (Orion) Future improvements!!!


> Gentlemen,
>
> In the future I hope that the Guys @ TT have the
> wisdom to offer "Hardware" improvements (when
> available) instead of offering a entirely new version
> of our Rig. Look what manufacturers like Icom did to
> us  when they brought out the IC-756, then the PRO,
> then the PRO 2, then the PRO 3!!!  All similar rigs
> but enough differences to preclude any chance of
> up-grading any of them by their owners which I think
> is an insult to all of us who ARE NOT independently
> wealthy or have a psycotic need to keep up with the
> "JONESES!!!"  $3400.00 is too big a chunk of change to
> have to part with every time TT brings out a better
> rig?
>
> The "ORION" is a stellar rig, no doubt about it, BUT
> still the hardware should be made avaialble when the
> time comes and it WILL!!!
>
> Any thoughts???
>
> Jim/nn6ee
>
>
>
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