Handiham World for 23 December 2009

23 December 2009 | by Patrick WA0TDA  |  Leave a Comment (0)

Welcome to Handiham World!

A few little changes…

Well, we have made it almost to the end of another year of publishing your weekly e-letter and podcast. Since I am taking a week of vacation between the holidays, this is your last weekly e-letter for the year of 2009. When we meet again in 2010, we are looking toward an exciting new decade in amateur radio. Just think about it — the next sunspot cycle, Cycle 24, is underway and sunspot activity should begin to climb in earnest in 2010. The 10 m band, which has languished in the seemingly endless solar minimum, will start showing signs of life again. It will be possible to work amazing amounts of DX with low power and small antennas. Even Handiham members living in apartments and condominiums will find that DX is within reach.

Braille book sitting on top of transceiverAs the decade moves forward, we will learn about new technologies. Ham radio is about innovation and experimentation in communications, so I think that’s a safe bet! I believe we will see advancements in accessibility for people with disabilities, partly because of software development and partly because of the now-assumed handshaking between amateur radio equipment and computers. Could it also be possible that manufacturers will build accessibility features right in instead of having users buy and install extra modules?

Amateur Radio education is going to be quite different in the next decade. You can see the change coming as we can access more and better online courses, and instructional materials in multimedia formats that are delivered in new and better ways. I feel confident that we are on the right track at Handihams when we stopped reading instruction manuals and instead began offering audio training based on a more practical method of simply teaching our members how to use their radio equipment. In the same way, we have stopped reading licensing manuals and instead teach online in a way that makes sense to our members with disabilities. No one is suggesting that books are going away, but they will be in new digital formats, available as digital downloads on portable electronic devices. The jury is out on whether these digital books will be accessible to readers who are blind or have reading disabilities and require audio readout of the text. Although it is easy to do with today’s technology, there is some fear among publishers that users will get a free audio book when they have only paid for a print version. Thus, some of our biggest hurdles remain social and political rather than technological!

Legal disputes over content management rights and patents could also cloud the future of accessibility. If software is found to violate a patent and must be withdrawn or changed, accessibility features within the software might be affected. This is a complicated area where technology and the law intersect and where breaking new ground is more likely to be the norm than the exception. I can only hope that accessibility does not go on the back burner in favor of time being spent to resolve other pressing issues in software design.

Still, I remain optimistic. In the natural tug-of-war between rapidly evolving technology and the legal system, there is enormous pressure to make content more easily accessible in spite of the efforts of those who simply can’t change with the times and learn to work with the new technology.

In the world of amateur radio software, rig control will become an expected feature and manufacturers will have to meet these expectations. If accessibility is built-in from the get go, we will not have a problem. On the other hand, if inaccessible features are placed on the software’s front end interface just to create a “pretty” screen, we may be in for an uphill climb. It is not, mind you, that we are insisting that software interfaces need to be bland and uninspiring. It is just that the functions of the software need to be accessible to people who must access computers by voice dictation or through screen readers. Traditional menu bar features really should be retained if at all possible. If a program presents a front-end interface designed for users without disabilities, that is only acceptable if there is an accessible alternative. I would like to hear from some of our readers and listeners who are knowledgeable about software. Specifically, what features must be designed into the software to make it accessible? Frankly, if we do not put our expectations on the table, we should not be surprised when new amateur radio software is designed for users without disabilities only. Yes, I know that this is the 21st century and people should know better, but I have learned that it is best not to assume that everyone really knows what they are doing! It is not that software designers purposely exclude people with disabilities. Rather, design is sometimes driven by a marketing department that is more concerned with the “look and feel” of the software’s interface and the engineers work toward that goal, unaware that users with disabilities may have difficulty using the software. In short, there is still plenty of ignorance out there!

In the past few weeks, I was notified that a user could not access all of our links in the newsletter. Even though we are aware of accessibility issues, it does show that problems will still crop up from time to time. In 2010, improving accessibility in the newsletter, website, and podcasts will be on our agenda. In fact, this very newsletter is now being produced using a new, state-of-the-art HTML editor, Microsoft Expression Web. Although Microsoft FrontPage has been a workhorse for us for over a decade, new web standards dictate that we needed to move forward with better editing tools. The Drupal content management system that we now use for Handiham.org also brings us into better accessibility compliance and offers us the opportunity to update web content more frequently and from anywhere, thus better serving our members and the amateur radio community.

One issue that I still struggle with is maintaining backward compliance. A reader informed me that a link would not work in Pine. I was surprised that this would come up, but it does show that there are legacy e-mail systems that are still in use and work perfectly well, provided that newer technologies maintain backward compliance. The question for me is, “how do I know what will be backward compliant?”

The answer is that sometimes I don’t, and that means that I depend on our readers and listeners to let me know when something does not work for them. We will do our best to maintain accessibility, though there may come a time that the new technology will become so obviously better and widely accepted that it may no longer pay to support backward compatibility. Believe me, this is a common problem in the world of technology. One obvious change that is certainly coming in the next decade is the retirement of the venerable Library of Congress four-track audio cassette. Maintaining backward compatibility for this old system right now means that we are converting MP3 files to a cassette system that is decades old. Most of us are familiar with a conversion from analog television to digital, a situation where the technology changed so radically that maintaining backward compatibility became somewhat of a political issue. In the world of radio, HD radio is now being promoted by broadcasters, both commercial and public. In amateur radio, you will find some communities that have really embraced D-Star repeaters while others live firmly and confidently in the world of analog repeater systems.

When does the big change get made? There is no firm answer to this. Taking the example of digital repeater systems and radios, there will always be a period of transition with people who are so-called “early adopters” leading the way and plucking down big bucks for the latest digital technology. Most users of repeater systems will take a wait-and-see attitude. After all, new repeater systems are expensive and require a lot of effort to change out. A radio club has to be able to not only pay for the cost of a new repeater system, but they also have to promote the new digital technology to all of the club members and prove that it is so much better that it is worth the money that each member will have to spend for a new digital-compatible radio. This is a huge hurdle to overcome because most of us have perfectly good analog equipment and many of us use their repeater system only occasionally. This makes it hard to justify spending several hundred dollars for new equipment. I think what needs to happen is that there needs to be a “critical mass” of users before everyone jumps on board with new technology. Holdouts who refuse to change at that point will simply be left behind or find it necessary to form a new user group for the old technology.

It will be interesting to see the new ARRL website next month when it comes online. The League has been careful to maintain accessibility on its website and I’m looking forward to using the new website and learning how its accessibility features compare to the current website. Most website developers these days do not provide plain text alternatives. The reason is that common web authoring software and content management systems provide for accessibility as long as they are used correctly. The assumption is that the user with a disability will upgrade his or her software system as the technology advances. This means using a reasonably current voice dictation system or screen reader program to access the new content or new software interfaces. At some point there is a critical mass of users with disabilities who are comfortable with the new technology and at the same time the number of users with old technology who cannot access new software and content falls below a critical mass necessary to continue support for backward compatibility.

I am confident that sometime in the next few years the number of users of the old four track tape system will drop below critical mass. With only a few users left, it will no longer be economically feasible to continue to produce materials for them. They will have to make the choice to move on to the new technology or provide some way themselves to get the new technology converted to the old technology format.

One thing that I would like to see in every amateur radio equipment review is a paragraph on accessibility. I am willing to reach out to our readers and listeners to discuss this topic and to exchange e-mails with anyone who is writing a review of equipment. The only thing is that I am not an expert on accessibility in the same way that our users are. After all, I can use my hands to type or control the knobs and buttons on a radio. I can see the radio’s display and I can view the computer screen and use a mouse. That means I’m likely to only be able to give superficial advice on accessibility. If any of our readers and listeners can help, I would certainly appreciate it. We will share your contributions with our audience on the website and credit you with your name and callsign if you wish. As we move into the next decade, let’s make sure that accessibility is job one.

For Handiham World, I’m…

Patrick Tice, [email protected]


Pat Tice, WA0TDA, is the manager of HANDI-HAM and a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com. Contact him at [email protected].

ICQ Podcast Series Two Episode Twenty-Six (20 December 2009) – A Weekend in Radio

20 December 2009 | by Colin M6BOY  |  Leave a Comment (0)
Series Two Episode Twenty-Six of the ICQ Amateur / Ham Radio Podcast. News Stories include:-

Your feedback, upcoming events, Hints, Tips and Tricks and Martin, M1MRB discusses a Weekend in Radio


Colin Butler, M6BOY, is the host of the ICQ Podcast, a weekly radio show about Amateur Radio. Contact him at [email protected].

The Noisy K3

18 December 2009 | by Paul Lannuier  |  Leave a Comment (0)
or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the RF Gain

The latest kerfuffle currently brewing on the Elecraft reflector concerns the “Noisy K3 receiver” and, predictably, the commenters have broken down into two opposing factions: the “Me Too!” group is posting comparisons with other receivers that supposedly have less background noise and less listening fatigue, and the “Not Here!” group which swears that their K3 is so quiet that they sometimes think it has been damaged.
Whether any or all of the complaints about background noise are valid, and/or whether these people have radios that are somehow defective or simply misadjusted is beyond my ability to discern. I’m not picking sides here, the guys who think their K3s are noisy may have real issues, and if so I’m confident Elecraft will address these issues as they have done with all others in the past. Perhaps we’ll all end up with better, quieter K3s in a few weeks as a result of this discussion.
That said, what really fascinates me is that some of my fellow amateurs apparently believe the RF Gain control to be an archaic, vestigial appendage left over from ancient days of vacuum tubes, and that it has no place or purpose in a modern receiver. To wit:

“Bill has linked to and quoted Eric’s paper which quite frankly seems way too complicated to me. IMHO, a modern DSP, microprocessor-controlled receiver should figure all of this stuff out automatically and do it for me … If the receiver has a properly designed AGC system then there are only two variables that are potentially the operator’s responsibility: 1) Preamp On/Off and 2) Attenuator On/Off. With the smarts built into modern radios, why can’t the radio do, for example upon band switching, a little routine of turning each of these on and off and measuring the resulting SNR and then setting them accordingly?” — N7WS

And:

“I’m used to leaving the RF gain wide open on the MkV, leaving the audio gain pretty much alone, and maybe switching between SLOW and FAST occasionally. I don’t seem to have any trouble hearing the weak ones under the strong ones. Now I have to fiddle with the RF gain (a small knob hidden amongst the others) while running a pileup. Not enough hands (or enough brains).” — VE7XF

Seriously? Not enough hands? No offense intended to these guys, fine gentlemen both, but we’ve long suffered complaints about how the K3 doesn’t have the all front panel controls one “needs” at his fingertips to tweak a signal to perfection. Now, a single RF Gain knob is too many controls to tweak in order to deliver a good sounding signal? And what N7WS is asking for falls under the general category of “Artificial Intelligence” — I think we’re going to have to wait a few more decades before we start seeing that offered in consumer electronics products!
The fact is, if you run the K3 or any other radio with RF Gain flat out, the result will be a higher level of background noise than if you “ride” the RF Gain. Whether analog or digital, a receiver’s AGC cannot magically discriminate a desired signal from noise. Instead, it will adjust the gain of the IF stages in response to the entirety of what it detects — that is, signal and noise. The purpose of the RF Gain control is to allow the operator to limit the range of the AGC to some degree in order to compensate for this lack of intelligence. RF Gain is like a transmission in a car, and just as an automatic transmission may work well some or perhaps even most of the time, it doesn’t always put the car in the right gear for every road condition. Similarly, the AGC doesn’t — and cannot — always deliver the optimum results under all band conditions. The RF Gain control is the radio’s stick shift. Use it.
Advancements in DSP technology have made it somewhat possible for a processor to detect speech or CW from random noise and perform the requisite voodoo to pass the wanted signal and suppress all else, but this technology still isn’t perfect. I don’t pretend to understand it all, but lot of math is employed to come up with what is still essentially a “best guess” as to what is, or isn’t, wanted. In my experience, it doesn’t always guess correctly; operator input is still required. The reason there are so many different possible settings for the Noise Reduction (NR) on the K3 is so you can choose what works best for you. But if you can’t be bothered riding the RF Gain a little bit, you surely won’t want to mess with the NR parameters.
Is my K3 unusually “noisy?” Honestly, I don’t know for sure. I don’t think it is; when I first got it I did comparisons with the JST-245, a rig which had a pretty damn quiet receiver. At the time I thought the K3 compared quite favorably. However, these tests were not scientific and the antennas used at the time were fairly crappy. Now I have a slightly better antenna… but alas, no more JST-245.
I did a brief A/B test with one of my NRD-515s on 40m SSB switching between both radios with the same antenna, each feeding identical NVA-515 speakers. It was a hands-down win for the K3 even with NR and AFX turned off. Tweaking both radios for best results, the difference in signal quality and intelligibility was pretty significant. Not exactly a fair fight, though… the NRD-515 is a 25 year old design.
Maybe I’d notice this perceived noisiness more if I had a quiet antenna and QTH. Unfortunately, I contend with a constant S7-8 background noise that I attribute to environmental factors (the QRN of suburban hell) and the fact that I have a vertical antenna, by nature more susceptible to electrical noise. In any case, I’ve never experienced how the K3 behaves on a quiet band. Under my typical conditions I can tweak the RF Gain, AF Gain and NR to maximize the quality of signals at or above the high noise level while reducing the background hash to a very acceptable level, but there is no single setting of controls that works on all signals. If I optimize for a relatively strong signal, I can reduce the background noise to practically nil but then weaker signals then become much less readable. Tweaking to separate the weakest signals from the noise is possible but that brings up the background noise as well — all the more so the weaker the signal and the closer it is to the noise floor. Every situation is different, so I’m constantly adjusting RF Gain and other controls to match the conditions much the same way I must downshift my Jeep when I climb a hill or drive through the twisties, or upshift when I reach cruising speed on a highway — no one gear works well all the time.
Once I find the best RF Gain setting for a particular signal, any noise that is still bothering me is handled extremely well by the NR (which, it cannot be overstated, is the whole purpose of having a NR function in the first place!). The K3’s NR has been greatly improved since trusty ol’ #216 arrived on my doorstep in January 2008. The original NR worked well for me as an SSB op, but the CW guys were not satisfied; so Elecraft changed the DSP voodoo to accommodate them. All of a sudden, I (and many others) found the NR didn’t work as well on SSB as it did in previous firmware versions, it made the output sound too hollow. So after we bitched and moaned about this, the boys in Aptos doubled the number of NR settings from 16 to 32, restoring the SSB-optimized NR settings and giving operators enough variety in NR level and aggression to satisfy everyone. I generally prefer very light NR, so I most often use the least aggressive setting in the 8-1 to 8-3 range to make copy comfortable to my ears; rarely do I use 8-4, but occasionally I will try the 7-x range on stronger signals. With the K3’s exceptional noise reduction I find myself adjusting NR more and RF and AF Gain less than I did in the pre-NR days with my JST-245, JST-135 and TS-930.
I hadn’t touched the AGC characteristic settings since the K3 was delivered, but today I decided to experiment with the AGC Slope and Threshold parameters just to see what effects they have. I found that the threshold (AGC THR) parameter makes a big difference in the amount of background noise amplified by AGC during periods of no signal. After a few hours of playing around the settings I ultimately settled on (for now) are:
  • AGC DCY: SOFT
  • AGC HLD: 0.20
  • AGC PLS: NOR (default)
  • AGC SLP: 012 (default)
  • AGC THR: 002
  • AGF-F: 100
  • AGC-S: 020 (default)
Thus configured, and with noise reduction off, AGC set to Fast, and both AF and RF Gain controls set to 12 o’clock position, I’ve found my sweet spot for tuning around under typical conditions. When find a station, I may switch on NR and/or adjust the AF or RF Gain until what I hear sounds right to my ears.
What it all boils down to is, using the RF Gain isn’t a burden, nor is it rocket science — it’s how I’ve always operated a receiver. Along with NR, Notch, Width and Shift, it’s simply another tool at my disposal to recover the most intelligibility out of a signal. Reaching for the RF Gain comes as naturally to me as it does for the AF Gain or VFO. The idea that some ops feel put out by having to tweak the RF Gain control is beyond incredible to me.


LHS Episode #029: Evil Empires

17 December 2009 | by Russ K5TUX  |  Leave a Comment (0)

deathstarIt occurs to me that having an episode discussing evil empires during a celebration- and holiday-filled time of year might be a bit ironic but that's just how things turned out.

Thank you to everyone who has so generously donated to the podcast so that we might have a presence at the upcoming Dayton Hamvention in May, 2010. It was an idea spawned at Ohio Linux Fest in September, 2009 and we've come a long way since then. Every contribution helps and we hope you'll continue to support Linux in the HAM Shack in the future. We also hope to provide timely and essential information to amateur radio enthusiasts and computer users for a long time to come.

From our world to yours, have a Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, Joyous Saturnalia, or just a good ol' time--whatever your "thing" might be. We hope you enjoy our latest installment of the podcast, and please: Keep spreading the word. Every month our audience grows, and we predict world takeover by 2014. Well, maybe not, but we are talking about evil empires after all...

73 de Russ, K5TUX


Russ Woodman, K5TUX, co-hosts the Linux in the Ham Shack podcast which is available for download in both MP3 and OGG audio format. Contact him at [email protected].

RTTY Got Me Into Amateur Radio

16 December 2009 | by Anthony K3NG  |  Leave a Comment (0)
When I was a wee little lad in the 70s, I used to go to my grandfather's house on Saturday. He was a ham radio operator since 1956 and had a modest station. There was a 60' tower in the backyard with a Mosley TA-33 Junior tribander and a 6 meter beam at the top and 80 and 40 meter dipoles. His main rig was a set of Kenwood-Trio 599 Twins, probably the last of the silver front Kenwood rigs, with a separate transmitter and receiver. In the shack was also a Clegg Venus VHF rig, a Gonset G-20 6 meter AM rig, and some kind of Hallicrafters receiver from the 60s, all of which he rarely turned on. He was mostly a phone op who would ragchew, though I found out in later years he was quite a CW op in the early days.

After dinner I would be watching TV in the living room (I think Hee Haw or Lawrence Welk was usually on) or perhaps coloring a picture in a coloring book or something little kids would do. Grandpa would be back in the hamshack playing with radios. I'd hear him tuning across an HF band, probably 40 meters considering all of the broadcast station heterodynes you would hear flying by. There might be some phone signals which I always thought sounded funny. And then I'd hear that signal, that undeniable warbling sound. Back then I couldn't really describe the sound, but I always knew immediately that Grandpa would soon be turning on the old Model 15 teletype in the shack.




The Model 15 was nearly spotless and looked new, despite being maybe 30 years old. Grandpa somehow got it after the war, World War II in which he served, brand new in a crate. He built some kind of big metal box that it sat on which contained the electronics to decode the magical signal off the air. It was about three feet tall, about 20" wide, two and a half feet deep, black, and had lots of lights, switches and knobs on it. They weren't those wimpy little knobs and switches you buy today, they were big. Each switch was labeled with a blue colored Dymo label. The big black box had a round CRT picture tube about 3" in diameter that drew a bright green trace on the white screen. The whole box was built like a tank, or at least it seemed to a young aspiring radio engineer like me. The Model 15 was black with a crinkle paint finish and a typewriter-like keyboard on the front with dark green keys that almost looked like bakelight. The keys had the usual assortment of QWERTY keys, but all sorts of other different keys like FIGS, BELL, and BREAK that I never saw on a typewriter but I knew served some special function.

Upon hearing the warbling signal from the living room, I'd drop whatever I was doing and would run into the hamshack. Grandpa would be turning the big knob on the radio to get the signal tuned in just right. He somehow knew exactly what it was supposed to sound like. He would then flip some switches in sequence on the big black box and it would begin to come to life. The CRT screen would warm up and I would see the familiar green dot in the middle appear faintly and then grow bigger and brighter. And then he would flip on a big recessed switch on the Model 15 teletype. The unit would kick on and there was a nice warm hum and whirring sound that would emanate out of it, filling the room. As it warmed up, it had a distinct smell that is hard to describe....that "old radio" smell. The big black box and Model 15 would sit for perhaps a minute warming up, waiting to do its weekly duty.

At the right time, Grandpa would take a cable terminated with a quarter inch headphone plug and plug it into the Kenwood Twins receiver headphone jack. The teletype would spring into action and the CRT display drew all kinds of squiggly lines on the screen, like a madman trying to draw with a spirograph.

I could see and hear the teletype mechanism inside the big Model 15 rhythmically jumping up and down. It was like insides of a typewriter, with little metal arms sitting in a semicircle. The teletype then started tapping away, striking letters on ink tape and writing on the beige colored paper. I would sit there entranced by the whole event, watching the teletype type and looking at the secret message encrypted in the warbling signal travelling over the ether as it was revealed to me. Grandpa might adjust a few knobs on the big black box to tweak the green pattern on the screen.

Sometimes the teletype would make a mistake and miss a letter or two or misspell a word. I would read out the message to Grandpa and figure out what the misspelled words were. Occasionally the teletype would really mess up and would throw a bunch of line feeds out and jump the paper in the middle of a word or paragraph. If the signal was really bad it would start to spew several inches of paper at a time and Grandpa would quickly unplug the jack from the radio, flip some switches on the big black box, or try to tune the signal in better. The show would last 15 or 20 minutes and afterwards Grandpa would sometimes let me put headphones on and tune around the band and listen to Morse code or foreign broadcasts coming in from far off lands.

Later in my teens I got my ticket and operated mainly phone for several years and got into electronics. Years later when I was in my 20s and off to college and making my way into the real world, I became mostly inactive in amateur radio. The Kenwood Twins were displaced with a Kenwood 820 and Grandpa sold the Model 15 and used the extra space for his computer.

Today I'll sometimes fire up DM780 on the computer and tune in a RTTY signal, but I miss the hum, whirl, and clack-clack of the big old Model 15 that got me interested in this strange old hobby. But perhaps someday I'll have a grandson who I can show Hellschreiber and PSK31 and he'll want to click the mouse on the waterfall and decode strange-sounding signals from far off lands.



Anthony Good, K3NG, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Pennsylvania, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

Handiham World for 16 December 2009

16 December 2009 | by Patrick WA0TDA  |  Leave a Comment (0)

Welcome to Handiham World!

What’s on your wish list for the holidays?

Pat at HRO poses with big Icom rig that he can't possibly afford.

Besides world peace, I mean? If you have asked Santa for some new ham radio gear, I hope your wishes are fulfilled. (I’m not holding my breath about getting one of those most excellent $11,000 Icom transceivers like the one I posed with for a photo op at HRO, but then again, I might rate something more affordable for Santa’s budget.)

Yes, I have placed a new HF rig on the wish list at the WA0TDA QTH. The reason is that I’m tying up my Icom IC-706 M2G on 2 meters and 70 cm, sometimes using it as an Echolink node, and that leaves me only an old Yaesu FT-747 for HF. Alas, the Yaesu has seen better days. I had acquired it around 20 years ago as a result of a lightning strike on my tower. My wife and I were at home when the storm moved through the Twin Cities, and we about jumped out of our shoes when the blinding flash of lightning lit up the neighborhood like a million camera flashes. The thunder was instant and loud, and that meant just one thing to me: We had just taken a lightning strike, because the thunder came at the same time as the flash of light. I opened the door to the ham shack and my old FT-101B was smoked. Literally. There was even an outline of the metal louvers on the bottom of the rig burned into the wooden desktop.

So I replaced that rig with the FT-747, which worked like a champ for 10 years. It started flaking out in subtle ways. Once I called CQ on what I thought was a clear frequency, only to be chastised by some guy whose QSO I’d interrupted. A bit of sleuthing with a plastic probe led me to an intermittent on a circuit board that had muted the receiver. After that fix, I had a couple more years of trouble-free operation out of the 747 until the display started to disappear at random, accompanied by a total receiver failure. That was also an intermittent, because you could prod the rig and wiggle connectors to get the display and receiver back to normal. Many tries later, both by me and our shop volunteer CJ, K0CJ, and the problem still crops up at random. But the rig really started to annoy me when it would decide to suddenly shift frequency about 500 Hz or so, also at random. This thing was definitely getting on my nerves!

In the 23 years since the FT-747 came out in 1987, the technology built into ham radio transceivers has evolved – a lot! Although the Icom IC-706M2G is a decade newer, its design is still dated. I would like a better receiver section and more options for signal processing. So a new transceiver in the $1000 class went on my Santa list.

Will Santa deliver? Have I been a good boy? Stay tuned to the Handiham podcast and weekly e-letter news to find out!

For Handiham World, I’m…

Patrick Tice, [email protected]


Pat Tice, WA0TDA, is the manager of HANDI-HAM and a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com. Contact him at [email protected].

Why Are Radios Horizontal?

15 December 2009 | by Paul Lannuier  |  Leave a Comment (0)

This thought has been keeping me awake at night. Yes, I know I probably need psychiatric help… but that still doesn’t answer the question, now does it?
Radio manufacturers appear to be locked into a belief that radios must be horizontally oriented. I don’t get it — this takes up more desk space and offers no discernible advantage over a vertically-oriented rig. Why not flip radios on their side?
The closest thing we’ve got to vertical radios are some commercial rack-mounted systems, but even then, each of the individual components in the rack are horizontal. The cubish Flex-5000A comes close, it is almost as tall as it is wide, but is still technically a horizontal rig. (Actually, it has no knobs so it’s not a real radio anyway. Never mind.)
Desktop PCs used to come in horizontal cases; now they are all happily ensconced in tidy, attractive vertical towers. Has anyone complained? I don’t think so…
Tallness projects power and demands respect — you never hear people marveling over the world’s widest building, do you? I believe the first radio maker who ventures out into this brave, new design direction will come to rule the market.
You heard it here first, folks.


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