[TenTec] Orion II v 2.042A: Not Ready for Prime Time!

[Gene Henderson]

Ron,
Looks like someone forgot to install this on a radio and see if it worked. 
I agree with you
not even close to Prime Time
Gene WB9HLA

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Ron Castro" <ronc at sonic.net>
To: "Ron Castro" <ronc at sonic.net>; "Discussion of Ten-Tec Equipment" 
<tentec at contesting.com>
Sent: Tuesday, April 13, 2010 21:50
Subject: Re: [TenTec] Orion II v 2.042A: Not Ready for Prime Time!


> Addendum to my post:  on problem #1, I'm referring to the RX audio.  TX
> audio (other than more drive needed and processor problem) still sounds
> broadcast quality.
>
>            Ron   N6IE
>       www.N6IE.com
>
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Ron Castro" <ronc at sonic.net>
> To: <tentec at contesting.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, April 13, 2010 6:41 PM
> Subject: [TenTec] Orion II v 2.042A: Not Ready for Prime Time!
>
>
>> Here are a list of problems I found right off with the v. 2.042A, even
>> after doing a battery reset and two master resets and memory clear:
>>  1.. Very noticeable distortion on all audio.  Sounds like overdrive in 
>> IF
>> or DSP section.
>>  2.. AGC hang in AF AGC.  S-meter goes up and never comes down!  At same
>> time, RF gain goes down and does not come back up.  If you manually turn
>> the RF Gain all the way to 0, then back up to 100, the radio is
>> essentially muted.  This will not happen if the "AGC Hang" setting is 0,
>> but then distortion is really bad.
>>  3.. NR does not work in AF AGC mode.  Does seem to work well in RF AGC
>> mode.
>>  4.. Much more audio drive needed on AUX input for SSB.  It looks like
>> about 10 dB more.
>>  5.. AM carrier= 1.25 Watts max!  That's at 100% PWR setting.
>>  6.. FM carrier= 6.4 Watts max.
>>  7.. SSB Speech Processor gives only around 50 Watts max peak output. 
>> You
>> can get it up to 100 Watts when you crank it to "way beyond reasonable
>> distortion".
>>  8.. Could not find any sort of S-Meter calibration
>> Here are the good points so far:
>>  1.. Side tone is louder and spot level is too.
>>  2.. Waterfall display is much improved.
>>  3.. Difference in frequency between Main and Sub improved, but still not
>> "phase locked".  I detect about 0.1 Hz differential which should make it
>> fine for true diversity antenna work.
>>  4.. In RF AGC mode, the NR really does seem improved, although it's hard
>> to tell with the audio distortion mentioned above.
>> So that's the good, the bad and the ugly of it!  I'm QSYing back to v.
>> 2.039d, the last one that worked right...
>>
>>            Ron  N6IE
>>       www.N6IE.com
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>
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