[TenTec] ARRL FTdx9000 ETR

[John Rippey]

". . . 'technical innovation' has certainly bloated the price of Icom  
and Yaesu's
$10,000 flagships, but their upconversion main receiver designs  
inherently
limits in-close cw reception performance. This ain't rocket science,  
just a
real head scratcher why only Ten-Tec seems to get it.

Barry N1EU"

Hi, Barry et al:

At least from ICOM's point of view, it's not a head scratcher. The  
IC-7800 is an amateur market derivative of a basic platform ICOM  
developed to serve a number of different markets. The last time I  
looked, ICOM is the only amateur transceiver manufacturer making a  
profit--the bulk of its sales are outside amateur radio and I hear  
its selling thousands of the IC-7800 clones. (Ten-Tec, being  
privately held, does not release financial results. However, if T-T's  
focus is on hams only, and CW performance first, as has been  
suggested, then one would not want to bet the farm on its survival  
(See FCC Docket No. 05-235, 7/19/05).

As to Yaesu, it has taken a big gamble with the FTdx9000 series due  
both to the substantial development costs and the fact that this  
radio does seem designed solely for the amateur market. Hard to  
recoup a big investment with such a tiny market. I doubt that close- 
in IMD numbers (<3 kHz) are going to be make or break with potential  
customers, however.

In fact, I suspect very few hams make their choice of a transceiver  
on this basis, especially since riding the RF gain is a proven way of  
dealing with contest-like IMD conditions, and most transceivers will  
respond well to this simple solution. In fact, as I understand it,  
some folks still have the habit of turning off the AGC under  
difficult conditions!

73,
John, W3ULS