[amsat-bb] Re: Dayton demos

[Patrick STODDARD (WD9EWK/VA7EWK)]

> I picked up one of the 100 that Alinco released this morning. I'll put
> together a review as soon as I get home.

I picked up one as well, early in the morning.  Need to see if any of
the Alinco dealers have accessories for it.  Nice little radio, and it
is a cross-band full-duplex (for 2m/70cm - did not test with 1.2 GHz)
HT as advertised.  Tuning steps as small as 5 kHz on all bands
means that - with a suitable antenna, and probably an amplifier - it
could be made to work on AO-51's L-band FM uplink.  Dayton price
is $299, much better than I had expected.  In Japan, Alinco's MSRP
is at 57000 yen (about US$ 600), so I thought it would be closer to
$400 even here at Dayton.

Without accessories, I disabled the full-duplex capability as not to
cause feedback on one AO-27 pass I tried with it this afternoon.  I
stood on the Indiana/Ohio state line, down the street from my motel
(west of Dayton, near I-70), and tried it with an Elk log periodic.
Separate knobs for volume and VFO on each band are just like the
IC-W32A.  The receiver may not be as sensitive as the IC-W32A,
or it seemed like that this afternoon.  I'll play with it more, to get a
better idea of how it stacks up against other radios I've used.

I already received one comment via e-mail after that AO-27 pass
this afternoon related to the new HT.  It mentioned that my audio
was low and sounded compressed.  The HT has a mic gain menu
setting from 1 to 4 - 1 is "quiet", 4 is "loud" per the manual.  Out
of the box, it was at 3.  It has already been moved up to 4, ready
for the next time I get on the birds with it.

73!



Patrick WD9EWK/VA7EWK - currently in Richmond IN
http://www.wd9ewk.net/