[TenTec] Orion NB vs NR

[Art]

Grant, thanks for your comments. Re the AGC controls, my experimentation 
certainly indicates that AGC is always on in one form or another.

Re varying opinions, mine is hardware related because I can compare the 
Orion to the Timewave DSP59+. The fundamental difference is the Timewave 
helps, the Orion DSP hurts. There's no kinder way to put it. Again, my 
frame of reference is narrowband CW weak signals on the low bands - 
primarily 80 and 40 - in the current Colorado atmospheric conditions.

This morning I discovered the hardware noise blanker deal. Tonight and 
tomorrow I'll see if that has had an effect on the NR situation. I refer 
to the fact that the hardware NB is not turned off when set to OFF but 
still enabled. Its effect on signals is only turned off when the 
hardware NB is disabled (no :H appearing above the NB switch). For 
previous posts my hardware NB was set to off, but not disabled. Could be 
I've been yapping away about poor NR performance when I was thinking I 
had no NB, but unknowingly did. This smacks of the infamous Yaesu NB 
problem on their current high end rigs where it is always on, and cannot 
be shut off even when the button says OFF, seriously impairing rx 
performance. At least the Orion hardware NB seems to go off when disabled.

Well. I'm getting a real initiation on this rig! Lest folks think I'm 
unhappy with my purchase, I'm not. Great rig. Just working my way thru 
the details. Next I'll be asking about that relay clacking away in my 
ear on QSK, and how to get rid of it.

73 Art

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Message: 10
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2006 08:08:02 -0400
From: "Grant Youngman" <nq5t at comcast.net>
Subject: Re: [TenTec] Orion NB vs NR
To: "'Discussion of Ten-Tec Equipment'" <tentec at contesting.com>
Message-ID: <000f01c6e940$19e562c0$aa75180a at SonyVaio>
Content-Type: text/plain;	charset="us-ascii"


> > The NR so far leaves much to be desired and, I say again, is 
> > significantly less effective than my Timewave DSP59+ (which 
> > has no NB function at all). 
>   

There are varying opinions on this.  NR characteristics differ depending on
the specific firmware release (pre 1.372, 1.372, 1.373Betas, v2 early, v2
current, etc).  And there has been a lot of discussion about why you should
not expect NR to do much on very narrow CW settings.


> > information and measurements. Hank implied that apparently 
> > there are 2 AGC loops, one of which is not disabled when we 
> > users set AGC OFF. 
>   

There is an AGC control point in the analog front end to protect the ADC.
You can't turn that "off".  If you did, strong signals (I think it kicks in
at 9+30), could just overload the ADC and cause a terrible mess.  I also
suspect the DSP AGC isn't "Off" either, at least not in the same sense the
AGC in an analog radio is off.

Grant/NQ5T