[AMRadio] "Have you ever tried SDR?"

[Rob Atkinson]

At the risk of offending a friend of mine who at one time had one of
the Flexie Digie Widgie radios, I too have been a witness to the SDR
operating scene and came away feeling glad that I never bought into
it--not my cup of tea--knobs and meters are my m.o. of choice.

When in a QSO, I prefer to focus on what the operator is saying to me;
not be looking at a monitor screen with a lot of graphic gadgets on
it.

If a ham wishes to do nothing but have an "entertainment center"
station he is missing out on half the hobby, the soldering iron half.
However there are a tiny number of hams who are able to get into their
plastic radios and do surface mount repairs and encode PROM chips and
all that--more power to them.  Most when asked if they can repair one
when it breaks however, don't even bother to answer the question--they
change the subject.  If you don't care if we become a throw away
consumer product hobby, then go ahead and promote the new gear.  I
care however, therefore I will promote the equipment operation that
most of us can understand and fix.

Besides all that, the natural world is an analog world--analog radio
operates directly on that world making its understanding an
understanding of some aspects pf our natural world, especially its
physics so there is a more direct connection between radio engineering
and physics as far as I'm concerned.  There's a more enjoyable and
exciting sensory experience with hot filaments and anodes, relay
noise, gas tube colors, and the smell of a hot chassis that all make
solid state equipment sterile and boring in comparison.

John, I enjoyed your column this month on your clever solution to your
work bench space problem.

73

Rob
K5UJ

On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 8:39 AM, CL in NC <mjcal77 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> This question was asked in a comment.  I have, and found it to be rather boring.